The Black Family

[jackiejlh]

Hi! I can't remember if it says in canon the age difference/birth order of Bellatrix, Narcissa, and Andromeda Black...also, the age difference between Sirius and Regulus Black. Who's older, who's younger? Any help would be greatly appreciated, as the only thing I can say for sure is the last time Sirius saw Bellatrix was in 1975, which was his

Comments

[neffable]

Bellatrix is the eldest, then Andromeda and then Narcissa, and Sirius is elder than Regulus. I don't think we know the actual age differences between them though.

[humantales]

Although it doesn't explicitly state it (I don't think), HBP implies that Bellatrix is the eldest. The house was going to her (not Narcissa or Andromeda) if the house insisted on going to a family member instead of to Harry as Sirius's will stated.

I can't point to anything specific, but I'm almost positive that Sirius is the elder of the two brothers. The Lexicon states that Regulus is the younger of the two.

[thepastperfect]

Pre-HBP, I was 98.9% positive that Bellatrix was oldest, but then everyone started saying, "No no no, Andromeda must be oldest 'cause she has the oldest kid." I felt very vindicated by HBP.

And in OotP, Sirius says, "He was younger than me, and a much better son, as I was often told." I don't have the page number, but yes, Regulus is younger.

[jackiejlh]

Thanks!

[vejgurl]

We don't have anything on the birth order of the Black sisters.

In 'A Sluggish Memory' from HBP, Slughorn said: "Good gracious, is it that time already?" said Slughorn. "You'd better get going, boys, or we'll all be in trouble. Lestrange, I want your essay by tomorrow or it's detention. Same goes for you, Avery." So we know there was a Lestrange at Hogwarts around the same time as Tom Riddle (the 1940s).

That's not really indicative of anything, though, since we don't know if it was Bellatrix's future husband, brother-in-law, father-in-law or someone else altogether.

The only thing we have on the Black brothers is from 'The Noble and Most Ancient House of Black' in OotP: Sirius jabbed a finger at the very bottom of the tree, at the name 'Regulus Black'. A date of death (some fifteen years previously) followed the date of birth.

'He was younger than me,' said Sirius, 'and a much better son, as I was constantly reminded.'

[vejgurl]

Addendum:

We don't know the birth order of Narcissa and Andromeda, actually. It could be assumed that Bellatrix is eldest, since Number Twelve Grimmauld Place and Kreacher would have gone to her, had Sirius not left them to Harry.

[masterofmystery]

The question here is, was the house going to Bellatrix because she was the eldest, or the eldest alive? Nowhere in the books is it explicitly said that Andromeda Tonks is still alive, but I'm pretty sure Ted is.

[vejgurl]

Meep! You're right!

I forgot how annoyed I was by the fact that neither Molly nor Remus knew whether or not Tonks had any family to go to for the holidays in HBP. What kind of shit is that??

Then again, if they had died in some sort of significant way (eg: at the hands of Death Eaters), I'm sure Molly and Remus would have known. But if they just died of death...maybe not.

[jamoche]

So was Sirius, though, and Harry's not on there at all.

[jackiejlh]

Sirius inherits it by birth, though - it was his mother's house. Harry inherited it through Sirius' will. I think for it to pass to the next member of the family, it would have to be someone still 'in the family'. Cousins and such can be a grey area. If they are female and have married off into different families, judging by the old-time customs they seem to follow, it would have been quite easy to just skip over them on the whole birthright thing.