Very early summer of 1981, since we know Albus "borrowed" the Cloak from James by late July. Hmm--he might have asked James to bring it to that very meeting. I forget when Albus's birthday is--I know it's not specified in canon, but Jo's said elsewhere, hasn't she?
Regarding another issue of timing--when was Severus hired as Potions Master? Because really, you'd have thought the announcement that Albus had given Snivellus a post at Hogwarts would have been greeted by the Marauders with about the same enthusiasm as the Trio greeted his elevation to Headmaster. Yet Sirius knew nothing about Snape being a master there until Remus told him in the Shack, and it doesn't seem the sort of thing Azkaban would make him forget.
And we know that major Hogwarts staffing changes are front-page news; minor ones are surely still announced. For that matter, Slughorn's retirement must have been a fairly major event, considering how many careers he'd brokered. So really, the appointment should have been in the Prophet, and if any of the Marauders had read it, they would have shared jokes about Snivellus dripping grease over poor ickle Firstie's causldrons with the others.
So if Sirius didn't know in fall 1981, it seems that none of the Marauders could have.
So either Albus successfully leaned on the Prophet to suppress the news of Slughorn's retirement and Snape's hiring....
Or it happened after the Potters were in deep hiding and no longer getting the Prophet, and Sirius too distracted by his Order duties and the Fidelius plan to either take it or pay much attention to it. Slughorn's retiring might have been big news; but I'd bet his replacement, an impoverished Half-Blood, wouldn't have rated a front-page picture, or maybe even mention. Though surely Albus's appointing a Half-Blood to be head of Slytherin must have been, ah, controversial? Indeed it looks like a deliberate slap in the face to the Pureblood supremacists like the Blacks. Still, if Snape's name weren't mentioned in the headline, Sirius, like his godson later, might have tossed the issue aside without reading it. Remus might have known, but by July Remus was estranged from the others. And Peter, of course, might have been asked not to mention the matter to his mates.
Which do you think more likely-- that Albus hired Severus over the summer and he started 9/1, as I'd previously supposed, but Albus managed to keep the news from the Prophet? Only, if so, the kids would be writing home to their folks, so the news would come out anyhow...
Or that Severus was really hired in, say, October, and the news didn't have time to reach the Potters and Sirius?
Or that Sirius and the Potters were so out of touch by summer/ fall 1981 that they went at least two months (9/1/81 would be the very latest you'd expect the announcement if Snape started at start of term) without ever hearing about their old rival's elevation? In which case, not only are the Potters and Sirius not getting (or not reading) the Prophet--they also aren't in touch with ANY school chums who are filling them in on current gossip of obvious interest to them. Including fellow members of the Order. Only way I can make that one work is if James and Sirius were so disliked no one voluntarily talked to them, once they were out of school and safe to snub. That might work--the only one who admitted to actually liking James was Hagrid, and he also liked Severus. (Not being one to hold 'bein' inneresttin' against anything.) So, although never the soul of discretion, he might have chosen not to bring Snape's name up with James & Sirius to have mud thrown at it. (Just as he later protected James's name by never telling Harry why Severus might have disliked Potter Senior so much.)
We know that it was "on the Dark Lord's orders" that Severus took up the post. But when?
About Albus' birthday, we know he was not yet 18 when his mother died, so he must have had a summer birthday. Out of canon Rowling first gave his age as 150, then changed his birth year to 1881 in his Wizard of the Month card (IIRC), I don't think she gave him an exact birthday yet.
The chief editor of the Prophet in the 1990s is a Slug Club alumnus. Not sure how high up he was in 1981.
I'm not sure being in deep hiding would necessarily preclude receiving the Prophet. Owls (both private and from Hogwarts) do arrive at 12GP when it is under Fidelius. But perhaps the Potters didn't want to risk receiving mail from outsiders, especially before they actually had the Fidelius cast.
Tom intended Severus to take the DADA spot. Hiring for this position may start early. In any case Albus was expecting to need to hire someone for this position ahead of time. But Albus wouldn't want to lose his agent in a year, so it was in Albus' interest to get Horace to decide to retire just then.
So, Tom may have sent Severus to get a job with Albus in spring. Albus' 'official' message to Tom was that he was interested, but needed to work out the details. Then he helped Slughorn decide to retire.
Tom had access to Peter for months. He decided to target the Potters by winter. I don't see him suddenly remembering in October that it would have been a good idea to plant an agent at Hogwarts. So in summary, I think Albus knew he was going to hire Severus for quite a while, but the official decision was made sometime in the summer.
I'm wondering how Horace's retirement was presented. If Horace felt responsible for his students falling into Tom's camp (and he became aware of that mostly after Severus' spying was beginning to have an effect, so over the months leading to his retirement) perhaps Horace himself wanted to keep the story quiet.
Adding to my previous post: If Severus was appointed later than Sep 1st of 1981, it was not because Tom's order came that late but because it took that long for Horace to decide to retire. Maybe there was some event that shook him terribly just then. I'm playing with the idea that a great-(great?)-grandnephew of his turned out to be a DE.
I'm playing, actually, with a different idea. Of course Tom wants to get an agent into Hogwarts. He always does, and more so if he's preparing to make his big push at the end of 1981.
But why would he imagine Severus to have any chance of success if he applied?
Possibly he'd already tried once to use Severus for that purpose (if Sybil is right that Severus were there in the Hogs Head that night for his own job interview). But if so, then Severus (who'd been kept clean for the purpose, whose enemy Sirius knew nothing against except that at school he'd hung out with the wrong crowd) were rejected at that time. And whether of not he'd been rejected by Dumbles for being a suspected adherent of Lord Voldemort at that time, his eavesdropping and taking the Prophecy straight to Tom must have created the impression Severus was a DE if it hadn't previously existed.
Sirius, in GoF, flatly rejected the supposition that Snape could ever have been [known to Dumbles as] an outright DE, because there's no way that Dumbledore would have hired such.
And in canon, of the two times Albus ended with a real DE on staff, once was an existing staff member who'd been turned, and once was a loyal follower who'd been replaced by an imposter. In both cases, one might assume that Albus didn't look as closely at them (in time) as he would a stranger who'd applied for the perpetual vacancy Tom had created.
So. Either Tom thought the same as Sirius. In which case he sent Severus to interview for the DADA vacancy (a second time) in the same spirit as Tom assigned Draco his "task"--when you fail, I'll have the excuse I need to murder you in front of your felllows as justified punishment. And in the off chance you don't fail, I've come out ahead. In which case he must have been very, very disappointed in Severus's performance as a DE. (And subsequently very, very distrustful of the implications of Sev's acceptance by Albus. I mean, the better the job Severus then makes of convincing Albus that he's happy to defect, the more that confirms Tom's original suspicion that Snape's adherence to the DE's was, by then, less than wholehearted.)
Or, Twinkles gave Tom (but not his own followers, or at least not Sirius) the impression that he would welcome "with open arms" a truly repentant DE and give him a place at his right hand. And teaching the innocent chidren. And Tom, deciding to take advantage of "Dumbledore's greatest weakness. [that] he has to believe the best of people", rather than trying once again to slip in a unsuspected DE, chooses Severus as the one devious enough (and a good enough Occlumens) possibly to be able to pull off the remorseful-DE act.
In which case, how did Twinkles give Tom that impression? And, er, why?
Hmm. Is Severus's failure to get himself hired the first time why Tom apparently recruited Regulus as a student? That he'd given up the idea of being able to insert someone already committed to him?
The timeline doesn't work. Regulus was recruited at 16, sometime in 1977-8, before the prophecy. Even disregarding the BFT dates completely, he died no later than 1980 and thus was recruited no later than 1979. That would be a tight squeeze.
Tom apparently continued the policy of keeping Severus 'clean' from acs that would obviously implicate him as DE even after the prophecy. So I don't think he lost hope of insinuating him at Hogwarts.
And if he was displeased with him, I wonder what it was that Severus had failed to deliver, as Muggle scalps was not on his list.
Snape finished Hogwarts in late June'78. Voldy would not expect him to be able to get the DADA in the upcoming year since Albus convinced Dippet not to hire Tom straight out of school, basically saying - too young, wait a few years. Tom is probably well aware that Albus really meant Dippet shouldn't hire Tom at all, but if the reason given was age, then it is unlikely that anyone is really ever hired straight out of school. Also, Tom has to see how well Snape performs in other ways. After all, I doubt Tom wasted time getting to know recruits before marking them. He could always get rid of them if they didn't work out.
So, I doubt he sent Snape after a Hogwarts position until the next year. However, just because few want the DADA job in Harry's time doesn't mean it was quite as difficult to come up with applicants in '79. IF Voldy doesn't send Snape out to apply until Summer '79, then the job for the next year might already be taken. This does give Snape an 'excuse' of job hunting when he overhears the prophecy (in Fall'79 or Winter'80). Whether he outright mentioned it - giving Sybil a reason to think that was what he wanted believes it to be true - or not is unknown.
But applying for school year '79-'80 would mean that it wouldn't be terribly surprising to be offered a job when a supposed empty slot arises two years later. Especially if Snape has been using the 'job search' interest as a way to keep contact with Albus, first to spy on him and then as an excuse to Voldy once Snape has turned Albus' spy.
As for as a notice in 'The Daily Prophet', I cannot see why a new teacher would rate a story. We never see 'the Prophet' run any such story in the books. Not even for Lockhart! The kids never now who the new teacher will be until they arrive at school. Now Slughorn retiring might be enough to make news, but his replacement wouldn't be unless he was an exceptionally well-respected potioneer. And I can easily see James and Sirius ignoring a story about Slughorn, so they would be unlikely to read the story all the way through IF Snape was mentioned as his replacement somewhere in the story.
I can accept your reading up to "it wouldn't be terribly surprising to be offered a job ... two years later."
But, see, the problem is what happened at the end of Severus's evening in the Hog's Head, whether it included a formal job interview with Albus or not.
Aberforth caught Severus eavedropping on Albus, he threw Severus out on his ear after dragging him before Albus to accuse him of spying, and Severus took the Prophecy straight to Tom.
On (so far as we know) their next encounter after that night, Severus's first words to Albus were "Don't kill me!"
And Albus's were, "What message does Lord Voldemort have for me?"
That is, Severus fully expected Albus to have identified him as a probable Death Eater and to deal with him accordingly (with an Unforgivable, perhaps). And he was correct in that suppusition: Albus did believe Severus to be Tom's loyal servant. (Whatever Albus had or hadn't passed on to the Ministry and his minions such as Sirius)
So, no, it wouldn't make sense for Albus to have been at all encouraging to any "job search" overtures from Severus in the meantime.
And surely, since Tom knows that Severus was CAUGHT spying on Albus, and that Albus knows that the information Snape gathered that night went straight to his master, Tom would assume that Severus had ruined his chances of presenting himself to Albus as innocent of being a DE.
Why would Tom imagine that Albus would welcome, with open arms, a DE who had truly repented of having joined? Not welcome into the Order (with strictly limited participation and information) but offer him a place at his side as Hogwarts staff?
And why, even if Tom did think Albus would fall for that, why would he choose Snape as the suitable "penitent" to pretend to turn his cloak?
As to an announcement in the DP--well, if it were published on September 1st (like Snape's appt. as Head was), Harry would never have noticed. None of the Trio even took the Prophet in the first books; later, Hermione wouldn't bother to pass on non-news, and Harry only ever scanned headlines on the front page.
(And yeah, I could totally see James and Sirius doing the same, if Slughorn's replacement was named in the fine print....)
Regarding another issue of timing--when was Severus hired as Potions Master? Because really, you'd have thought the announcement that Albus had given Snivellus a post at Hogwarts would have been greeted by the Marauders with about the same enthusiasm as the Trio greeted his elevation to Headmaster. Yet Sirius knew nothing about Snape being a master there until Remus told him in the Shack, and it doesn't seem the sort of thing Azkaban would make him forget.
And we know that major Hogwarts staffing changes are front-page news; minor ones are surely still announced. For that matter, Slughorn's retirement must have been a fairly major event, considering how many careers he'd brokered. So really, the appointment should have been in the Prophet, and if any of the Marauders had read it, they would have shared jokes about Snivellus dripping grease over poor ickle Firstie's causldrons with the others.
So if Sirius didn't know in fall 1981, it seems that none of the Marauders could have.
So either Albus successfully leaned on the Prophet to suppress the news of Slughorn's retirement and Snape's hiring....
Or it happened after the Potters were in deep hiding and no longer getting the Prophet, and Sirius too distracted by his Order duties and the Fidelius plan to either take it or pay much attention to it. Slughorn's retiring might have been big news; but I'd bet his replacement, an impoverished Half-Blood, wouldn't have rated a front-page picture, or maybe even mention. Though surely Albus's appointing a Half-Blood to be head of Slytherin must have been, ah, controversial? Indeed it looks like a deliberate slap in the face to the Pureblood supremacists like the Blacks. Still, if Snape's name weren't mentioned in the headline, Sirius, like his godson later, might have tossed the issue aside without reading it. Remus might have known, but by July Remus was estranged from the others. And Peter, of course, might have been asked not to mention the matter to his mates.
Which do you think more likely-- that Albus hired Severus over the summer and he started 9/1, as I'd previously supposed, but Albus managed to keep the news from the Prophet? Only, if so, the kids would be writing home to their folks, so the news would come out anyhow...
Or that Severus was really hired in, say, October, and the news didn't have time to reach the Potters and Sirius?
Or that Sirius and the Potters were so out of touch by summer/ fall 1981 that they went at least two months (9/1/81 would be the very latest you'd expect the announcement if Snape started at start of term) without ever hearing about their old rival's elevation? In which case, not only are the Potters and Sirius not getting (or not reading) the Prophet--they also aren't in touch with ANY school chums who are filling them in on current gossip of obvious interest to them. Including fellow members of the Order. Only way I can make that one work is if James and Sirius were so disliked no one voluntarily talked to them, once they were out of school and safe to snub. That might work--the only one who admitted to actually liking James was Hagrid, and he also liked Severus. (Not being one to hold 'bein' inneresttin' against anything.) So, although never the soul of discretion, he might have chosen not to bring Snape's name up with James & Sirius to have mud thrown at it. (Just as he later protected James's name by never telling Harry why Severus might have disliked Potter Senior so much.)
We know that it was "on the Dark Lord's orders" that Severus took up the post. But when?
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The chief editor of the Prophet in the 1990s is a Slug Club alumnus. Not sure how high up he was in 1981.
I'm not sure being in deep hiding would necessarily preclude receiving the Prophet. Owls (both private and from Hogwarts) do arrive at 12GP when it is under Fidelius. But perhaps the Potters didn't want to risk receiving mail from outsiders, especially before they actually had the Fidelius cast.
Tom intended Severus to take the DADA spot. Hiring for this position may start early. In any case Albus was expecting to need to hire someone for this position ahead of time. But Albus wouldn't want to lose his agent in a year, so it was in Albus' interest to get Horace to decide to retire just then.
So, Tom may have sent Severus to get a job with Albus in spring. Albus' 'official' message to Tom was that he was interested, but needed to work out the details. Then he helped Slughorn decide to retire.
Tom had access to Peter for months. He decided to target the Potters by winter. I don't see him suddenly remembering in October that it would have been a good idea to plant an agent at Hogwarts. So in summary, I think Albus knew he was going to hire Severus for quite a while, but the official decision was made sometime in the summer.
I'm wondering how Horace's retirement was presented. If Horace felt responsible for his students falling into Tom's camp (and he became aware of that mostly after Severus' spying was beginning to have an effect, so over the months leading to his retirement) perhaps Horace himself wanted to keep the story quiet.
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But why would he imagine Severus to have any chance of success if he applied?
Possibly he'd already tried once to use Severus for that purpose (if Sybil is right that Severus were there in the Hogs Head that night for his own job interview). But if so, then Severus (who'd been kept clean for the purpose, whose enemy Sirius knew nothing against except that at school he'd hung out with the wrong crowd) were rejected at that time. And whether of not he'd been rejected by Dumbles for being a suspected adherent of Lord Voldemort at that time, his eavesdropping and taking the Prophecy straight to Tom must have created the impression Severus was a DE if it hadn't previously existed.
Sirius, in GoF, flatly rejected the supposition that Snape could ever have been [known to Dumbles as] an outright DE, because there's no way that Dumbledore would have hired such.
And in canon, of the two times Albus ended with a real DE on staff, once was an existing staff member who'd been turned, and once was a loyal follower who'd been replaced by an imposter. In both cases, one might assume that Albus didn't look as closely at them (in time) as he would a stranger who'd applied for the perpetual vacancy Tom had created.
So. Either Tom thought the same as Sirius. In which case he sent Severus to interview for the DADA vacancy (a second time) in the same spirit as Tom assigned Draco his "task"--when you fail, I'll have the excuse I need to murder you in front of your felllows as justified punishment. And in the off chance you don't fail, I've come out ahead. In which case he must have been very, very disappointed in Severus's performance as a DE. (And subsequently very, very distrustful of the implications of Sev's acceptance by Albus. I mean, the better the job Severus then makes of convincing Albus that he's happy to defect, the more that confirms Tom's original suspicion that Snape's adherence to the DE's was, by then, less than wholehearted.)
Or, Twinkles gave Tom (but not his own followers, or at least not Sirius) the impression that he would welcome "with open arms" a truly repentant DE and give him a place at his right hand. And teaching the innocent chidren. And Tom, deciding to take advantage of "Dumbledore's greatest weakness. [that] he has to believe the best of people", rather than trying once again to slip in a unsuspected DE, chooses Severus as the one devious enough (and a good enough Occlumens) possibly to be able to pull off the remorseful-DE act.
In which case, how did Twinkles give Tom that impression? And, er, why?
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And if he was displeased with him, I wonder what it was that Severus had failed to deliver, as Muggle scalps was not on his list.
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So, I doubt he sent Snape after a Hogwarts position until the next year. However, just because few want the DADA job in Harry's time doesn't mean it was quite as difficult to come up with applicants in '79. IF Voldy doesn't send Snape out to apply until Summer '79, then the job for the next year might already be taken. This does give Snape an 'excuse' of job hunting when he overhears the prophecy (in Fall'79 or Winter'80). Whether he outright mentioned it - giving Sybil a reason to think that was what he wanted believes it to be true - or not is unknown.
But applying for school year '79-'80 would mean that it wouldn't be terribly surprising to be offered a job when a supposed empty slot arises two years later. Especially if Snape has been using the 'job search' interest as a way to keep contact with Albus, first to spy on him and then as an excuse to Voldy once Snape has turned Albus' spy.
As for as a notice in 'The Daily Prophet', I cannot see why a new teacher would rate a story. We never see 'the Prophet' run any such story in the books. Not even for Lockhart! The kids never now who the new teacher will be until they arrive at school. Now Slughorn retiring might be enough to make news, but his replacement wouldn't be unless he was an exceptionally well-respected potioneer. And I can easily see James and Sirius ignoring a story about Slughorn, so they would be unlikely to read the story all the way through IF Snape was mentioned as his replacement somewhere in the story.
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But, see, the problem is what happened at the end of Severus's evening in the Hog's Head, whether it included a formal job interview with Albus or not.
Aberforth caught Severus eavedropping on Albus, he threw Severus out on his ear after dragging him before Albus to accuse him of spying, and Severus took the Prophecy straight to Tom.
On (so far as we know) their next encounter after that night, Severus's first words to Albus were "Don't kill me!"
And Albus's were, "What message does Lord Voldemort have for me?"
That is, Severus fully expected Albus to have identified him as a probable Death Eater and to deal with him accordingly (with an Unforgivable, perhaps). And he was correct in that suppusition: Albus did believe Severus to be Tom's loyal servant. (Whatever Albus had or hadn't passed on to the Ministry and his minions such as Sirius)
So, no, it wouldn't make sense for Albus to have been at all encouraging to any "job search" overtures from Severus in the meantime.
And surely, since Tom knows that Severus was CAUGHT spying on Albus, and that Albus knows that the information Snape gathered that night went straight to his master, Tom would assume that Severus had ruined his chances of presenting himself to Albus as innocent of being a DE.
Why would Tom imagine that Albus would welcome, with open arms, a DE who had truly repented of having joined? Not welcome into the Order (with strictly limited participation and information) but offer him a place at his side as Hogwarts staff?
And why, even if Tom did think Albus would fall for that, why would he choose Snape as the suitable "penitent" to pretend to turn his cloak?
As to an announcement in the DP--well, if it were published on September 1st (like Snape's appt. as Head was), Harry would never have noticed. None of the Trio even took the Prophet in the first books; later, Hermione wouldn't bother to pass on non-news, and Harry only ever scanned headlines on the front page.
(And yeah, I could totally see James and Sirius doing the same, if Slughorn's replacement was named in the fine print....)
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