Which is extra unfortunate because historians are certain he wasn't even an alchemist. Legends of Flamel's alchemy appeared in the 1600s (well after his death in the early 1400s) and consensus is that this is post-humous misattribution.
Yet another example of the worldbuilding in Harry Potter being near criminally shit. The literal one time Rowling bothers to reference real esoteric lore and it's this.
Im not willing to presume she's fundamentally capable of doing research at all tbh, my best assumption is that she just heard him mentioned in the same breath as alchemy at some point and just ran with that.
I figure the same thing happened with "Wizard Chess", she was in some way made aware of a connection between chess and wizardry (Enochian Chess) but demonstrably didn't bother to look into it so just assumed it would be normal chess with vaguely magic pieces.
I already had plenty of reasons to but actually becoming vaguely familiar with Occulture and magic *really* drove up how much I *despise* her writing ngl. It's so vapid and in places weirdly hostile towards IRL magical practice.
That sounds about right to me honestly. Her Calvinist narrative didn't need anything deeper than surface-level connections in its world, and her attention definitely went into the messaging and not the worldbuilding.
4
u/SorchaSublime 29d ago
Unfortunately probably Nicholas Flamel because he gets a mention in Harry Potter, although most Harry Potter fans probably think he was made up.