Molly Elizabeth Weasley (née Prewett) (born 30 October, 1949) was an English pure-blood witch and matriarch of the Weasley family after marrying Arthur Weasley. She was born into the Prewett family and was sister to Fabian and Gideon Prewett, members of the original Order of the Phoenix.
Molly attended Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry and was sorted into Gryffindor House. Sometime after she graduated, both her brothers were murdered by Death Eaters in the First Wizarding War. Molly and Arthur ended up having seven children, consisting of six sons named Bill, Charlie, Percy, Fred, George and Ron and only one daughter named Ginny Weasley. She also played a large part in the life of Harry Potter, acting as a motherly figure towards him.
Molly was a member of the revived Order of the Phoenix following the return of Lord Voldemort and participated in the final battle of the Second Wizarding War. Her actions during this battle caused her to be known as the witch that defeated and killed the notorious Death Eater Bellatrix Lestrange.
Biography
Early life (1949-1981)
A young Molly at school
Molly was born on 30 October, 1949, in Ottery St. Catchpole, Devon, to Alfred and Mary Prewett. She had two older brothers: Gideon and Fabian. Her mother, Mary, had been a member of the House of Macmillan before she married her father, Alfred Prewett, in 1940. Molly was the great-niece of Ambrose Macmillan, and at that time he was the family's head.
Family History
Molly's mother, Mary, was the only daughter of Caius Macmillan, younger brother of Ambrose Macmillan II, an extremely important wizard, former member of the Wizenagmot, and Envoy to the International Confederation of Wizards. Molly's great uncle Ambrose was also the Head of the Macmillan family. As such, Molly's mother Mary, being her father's only daughter, made Caius Macmillan extremely hopeful that she might marry into a more wealthy family so that his bloodline would flourish and be more successful than his brother's.
However, Molly's father, Alfred Prewett, was not so wealthy as her grandfather Caius had hoped, and the Prewetts' estate, which sat on a large piece of land in Ottery St. Catchpole, Devon, had accidentally been burned down the day before Alfred and Mary's wedding in 1940. Upon Molly's great uncle Ambrose's request, the wedding then took place at the Macmillan Head's estate in Castle Cary, Somerset. The Prewetts were all invited, but they felt out of place and awkward at Ambrose Macmillan's stately mansion, leading Mary to come close to "bursting into tears," as she would later say.
Alfred and Mary were given the plot of land where the former home of the Prewetts once stood by Alfred's father, Clarence, and together they were the ones to build the Burrow, the house that is now the home of the Weasleys. Alfred Prewett additionally built the Lovegood's home across the way from Ottery St. Catchpole, intending for his brother Bilius to live in it.
Childhood (1950-1961)
Her brothers, Fabian and Gideon, started school in 1956. Both of them were sorted into Gryffindor, like their parents. They wrote letters home to her about life at school. Ever since then, Molly had "wanted to go."
Hogwarts years (1961-1968)
Molly began attending Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry in 1961 and was sorted into Gryffindor House. She was taught Potions by Professor Horace Slughorn. She once said that in her youth, she brewed a love potion.
It was Hogwarts where Molly met Arthur Weasley, whom she began dating. One night, they went out for a night-time stroll and whilst Arthur got caught by Apollyon Pringle, she managed to get back to Gryffindor Tower at four in the morning and was told off by the Fat Lady.
First Wizarding War (1970-1981)
Molly graduated from Hogwarts in June of 1968. She and Arthur wed soon after. On 18 July, 1969, however, Molly's father, Alfred Prewett died. Molly was heartbroken because she had longed for her father to give her away. Nevertheless, the marriage took place in October, later that year, and Molly's widowed mother, Mary, moved out of the Burrow to live in a smaller house in Oxford, and the newly-wed Weasleys moved into the Burrow, Arthur not yet having enough funds to buy a house of his own.
The family lived at The Burrow on the outskirts of Ottery St Catchpole in Devon. Molly and Arthur's first child, William, was born 29 November, 1970. More children followed: Charlie, Percy, and twins Fred and George. After having her first five sons, she longed to have a daughter but had another son, Ronald, before finally having a daughter, Ginevra.
Molly was present at the wedding of her brother Gideon to Dahlia Fowler in 1972. She became an aunt the same year that her third son, Charlie, was born. Her niece's name was Maud Prewett.
Around the summer of 1975, the year before the birth of her third son Percy, both of Molly's brothers, Fabian and Gideon, joined the original Order of the Phoenix, a special organisation designed to combat Voldemort and his Death Eaters. Their widowed mother, Mary, was not told that Gideon and Fabian were apart of this vigilante group at first, as they hadn't wanted to scare her or let her argue her way out of them doing it. Molly was also sworn to keep the secret.
Molly's brothers were both members of the Order, but were murdered during the war by five Death Eaters on 10 February, 1981, including Antonin Dolohov, who was subsequently imprisoned in Azkaban for the crime. They died as heros, responding to a call about the Dark Mark being spotted in the sky. The Death Eaters had reportedly lured them there to murder members of the Order.
Given the way she speaks about Gideon and Fabian, Molly was distraught at their deaths and inherited most of Fabian's things, keeping a watch of his for several years.
After the death of Gideon, Molly's sister-in-law, Dahlia, and eight-year-old niece, Maud, moved in with the Weasley family in Ottery St. Catchpole in the spring of 1981. Molly home educated her in reading, writing and simple maths, along with her older children, Bill, Charlie, and Percy.
Later life (1981-1998)
By 1983, by which point Molly's niece, Maud, had turned ten years old, Gideon's wife and daughter moved to the nearby wizarding village of Chudley, in Devon. Dahlia had become employed by the Ministry of Magic, working for Magical Maintenance.
In the year 1990, Molly's paternal uncle, Bilius Prewett, saw a Grim and then died 24 hours later. The house that he had lived in (which had been built by Molly's late father, Alfred Prewett, in the shape of a rook) was sold to Xenophilius Lovegood, who moved in with his wife, Pandora, and daughter, Luna, aged nine.
By 1991, all her children from Bill to Fred and George had been accepted to Hogwarts and Sorted into Gryffindor House, and Ron's first year at Hogwarts was to begin. Molly and Ginny accompanied Percy, Fred, George, and Ron to King's Cross Station, although her daughter was too young to begin school herself. After Percy, Fred, and George got onto Platform 9¾, another young boy approached her and politely asked how to get onto the Platform. She kindly gave him instructions, and told him to go ahead before Ron.
After getting onto the platform with Ginny, Molly learned that the boy she had just talked to was Harry. When Fred and George wondered if he remembered what Lord Voldemort looked like, she became stern and forbade them from asking him. When last calls for the train came, Molly ushered her children onto the train and called for them to have a good term. She addressed the twins, telling them that she didn't want to receive anymore owls that they had blown up a toilet, and George quipped that they would send her a Hogwarts lavatory seat.
Having become friends with Harry, Ron contacted Molly shortly before the Christmas holidays to tell her that Harry wasn't expecting any presents. She came to the rescue, knitting him an emerald green Weasley jumper and making him a box of home-made fudge. For the Christmas holidays, Molly, Ginny, and Arthur also went to Romania to visit their son Charlie.
When Harry and the others returned from Hogwarts for the summer, he thanked Molly for the jumper and fudge, to which she insisted it was no trouble. When Harry's uncle Vernon barked at him to get moving, she tried to engage him in conversation, which ended up going nowhere.
Summer of 1992
One night, Molly was scared to death when she found Fred, George, and Ron's beds empty, the family car gone, and no note left behind explaining what the boys were doing. When the trio returned with Harry the next morning, having flown to Surrey and back, her anger exploded and she yelled at them for what, to Harry, seemed like hours. She didn't blame Harry, but threw her sons nasty looks the whole time she made breakfast. To punish them, Molly made them de-gnome the back garden. When she looked up the process in Gilderoy Lockhart's Guide to Household Pests, Fred implied that his mother had a crush on Lockhart. While she said the thought was ridiculous, her body language told another story — she beamed at his picture and blushed slightly.
About a week after Harry arrived at the Burrow, Molly and Arthur took the family and Harry to Diagon Alley to buy their school supplies. Before leaving, she and Arthur learned that Harry had never travelled through the Floo Network before. After Harry got lost in Knockturn Alley, she was relieved to find him safe with Hagrid, being grateful to the half-giant for finding him. After getting their money from Gringotts, Molly departed with Ginny to a second-hand robe shop, to meet the others an hour later at Flourish and Blotts. After Arthur got into a fist fight with Lucius Malfoy, she was livid, claiming that his actions were a bad example to set for their children.
On her daughter Ginny's eleventh birthday, on 11 August, 1992, Molly's husband, Arthur, deceived her by telling her that he would take Ginny to work with him in the morning and then out to pick up ingredients with her for a special birthday dinner. What he really did was take her to Diagon Alley, for a special lunch and ice cream, on top of the birthday grocery shopping. It is unknown if Molly ever found out about this.
Second opening of the Chamber of Secrets
After dropping the children off at King's Cross Station on 1 September, Molly and Arthur were outraged when they found their car gone. That night, she received a letter from the head of Gryffindor Minerva McGonagall explaining what Harry and Ron had done. The next day, she sent a Howler to Ron, expressing her absolute disgust at his reckless behaviour and the fact that Arthur was now facing an inquiry at work over the charmed Ford Anglia.
Around December of 1992, Molly's children, Ginny and Ron, sent their mother a letter. Ginny's half of the letter asked if it would be possible for Molly to make her new friend Aquila a jumper, because she, much like Ron's friend Harry in the previous year, wasn't expecting any presents. Molly saved the day for the second year in a row- knitting Harry and Aquila Christmas jumpers, and also sending Harry some homemade treacle tart. Aquila received a tin of specially-decorated biscuits.
In the spring of 1993, Molly and Arthur arrived at Hogwarts, who were extremely worried after learning that the Monster of Slytherin had taken Ginny into the Chamber of Secrets. When Harry and Ron brought her back safely, along with a small girl who Molly learned was Ginny's friend Aquila, she was grateful to Harry and curious as to how he managed it. After Harry explained everything, she accompanied Ginny to the hospital wing. Molly and Arthur watched Ginny and Aquila sleep off their ordeal while they discussed what exactly had happened.
Sirius Black's escape from Azkaban
- "We tried to shut him in a pyramid. But Mum spotted us."
- —Fred and George referring to their time in Egypt
That summer, Arthur won the annual Daily Prophet Grand Prize Galleon Draw. He and Molly decided to spend the gold on a trip to Egypt to visit Bill. While Bill took them on tours of the pyramids, she refused to let Ginny come into the last one, which was full of "mutant skeletons" of Muggles who had broken in and "grown extra heads."
After returning from Egypt in August, about a week before the new school year, Molly learnt from Arthur that Sirius Black had escaped from Azkaban Prison and that his target was supposedly Harry, as Sirius was muttering "he's at Hogwarts" in his sleep. She also heard from Arthur that former prisoner intended to murder Harry. In conjunction with these events, Molly's son Percy informed her that Ginny's best friend, Aquila, was supposedly a relative of Sirius's.
Molly also most likely read in the paper of Aquila's mother, Walburga Black, throwing out Ministry reporters from her villa when they came to the South of France to enquire about Sirius Black's whereabouts. Narcissa Malfoy would have also been referenced in the article, titled "Still an Outcast: Mother of Escaped Criminal Seeks Black's Recapture."
According to Percy, this was the most informative source regarding Aquila Black's family, and he shared this article with Molly, which she felt "embarrassed having around the house" and threw away. Whether she did not seek to know the details of Aquila's life, or if she did, she decided to keep said information away from Ginny. Ginny, who already knew everything, would have not been affected either way. Molly additionally forbade Percy from conspiring with any of his brothers about Aquila's origins, and admonished him for bringing it up.
After meeting Harry in Diagon Alley on 31 August, Molly discussed Black's connection to Harry with Arthur, who wanted to tell Harry the truth about why Black was supposed to be after him. Arthur also brought up Aquila. Molly told him that it was best not to send any of their children to school with the subject of Black hanging over their heads. She also didn't want to send Harry to school with knowing about Black being after him, convinced that he would be perfectly safe from harm since Dumbledore was stationed at Hogwarts. Arthur then countered that if Black could break out of Azkaban, then he was capable of breaking in to Hogwarts. The next day, Molly and Arthur saw Harry, Ron, Hermione, and the others off to school. The following June, she arrived at King's Cross to pick her family up.
Physical Description
Molly was frequently described as a short, slightly plump, and kindly-looking woman. Like the rest of her immediate family, she had flaming fiery red hair. She had warm brown eyes.
Molly was described as "porky," by Draco Malfoy and "dumpy" by Vernon Dursley, despite the fact that he and his son were much larger than her.
Personality and Traits
Molly was a kind-hearted, gentle, loving, and very motherly woman. It was comfortable to be around such a sympathetic and warm person. Being in the same room with her was very reassuring. Appalled at the mistreatment that Harry suffered at the Dursleys, Molly was delighted to have Harry stay with the Weasleys at The Burrow, where she could offer food, advice, and general mothering. Starved for affection from his own aunt Petunia, Harry found warmth from Molly, who considered to be his closest mother figure.
Molly pampered her seven children as much as she could afford to, making up for the lack of funds for new books, brooms and robes by showering her loved ones with affection and providing them with abundant and delicious home-cooking and handmade gifts. However, Molly had no qualms about speaking her mind and enforcing discipline when her children put a "toe out of line"; the only thing Hermione Granger could do to stop Fred and George testing their Skiving Snackboxes on first years prior to their departure from Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry was threaten to write to their mother, something which genuinely scared them. She constantly tried to pressure Bill into cutting his hair and not dressing as flashily as he liked to. Molly had a strong desire for her children to work at the Ministry of Magic like their father, causing her to scold Fred and George on numerous occasions for their dream of managing a joke shop. In the end, she clearly wanted her children to be happy in their careers, being impressed when Fred and George proved to be skilled businessmen.
Etymology
Molly is a diminutive form of Mary, the English form of the Hebrew name Miryam, the meaning of which is unknown, though theories include "sea of bitterness", "rebelliousness", "wished for child", and "beloved". In the case of Molly Weasley, however, the name is most likely derived from the term "mollycoddle," meaning to "to pamper or overprotect."
The surname Prewett is Welsh in origin. It is derived from the Middle English word prou, meaning "brave" or "valiant", and the suffix "-et", which implies smallness. Thus, it is believed to be derived from a nickname for someone small, but brave.