rymenhild

It really isn't, and

the_gentleman knows it. He has undertaken the monumental task of making the Founders of Hogwarts make historical sense, and, unbelievably enough, he's succeeding. He disdains the Founders' "crappy little nom de magiques" (Slytherin, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, Gryffindor) as "14th century additions"; it's the only reasonable explanation I've ever heard for the philological mess that is "Gryffindor". In the post-1066 world where

the_gentleman places the Founding, Godric (later called Gryffindor) is a displaced Saxon nobleman, Rowena (Ravenclaw) is an educated nun from an obscure Northumbrian convent, and Helga (Hufflepuff) is the daughter of a Danish trader. The real stroke of brilliance here, though, is Salazar (Slytherin), revealed by

the_gentleman to be a Norman-Jewish moneylender whose name as we know it is an Anglicized form of Eliezer. No wonder Salazar and Godric didn't get along.

**

In my much-belated applause-of-friends meme, I'm up to

muffinbutt.

muffinbutt is an intelligent, funny lover of books. As the puppetteer for Bernard Wrangle, Head Bartender, Milliways Bar, she regularly has me laughing loudly enough to irritate my roommates. As a writer of Good Omens fic, she earns my admiration, and as the person who suggested to me earlier today that there was something unwholesome about Anne Shirley's love for the ghost of Matthew Cuthbert, she ... causes my mind to boggle. Wonderfully so.

**

It seems that instead of teaching Emma this spring, I will be teaching Great Expectations. This may very well be my least favorite book ever written. Charles Dickens is, in fact, one of the lesser-known reasons why I am a medievalist now. Oh, joy.