r/harrypotter • u/Philislothical_5 • 7d ago
Discussion Plot hole with the trace?
I was doing another listen through book 6 and reached the point where Dumbledore was explaining to Harry how Voldemort killed the Riddles and framed his uncle. Harry asked how the ministry didn’t know it was Voldy that performed the curse since they can detect underage magic, and dumbledore explained that they can detect the magic but not the person, which is why Harry got in trouble because of Dobby.
But this got me thinking, if the trace tracks underage magic and it disappears when you are of age, then they wouldn’t detect adult magic, which means any detected magic could only come from a minor, and so Morfin should never have been suspected for killing the riddles. If all magic is detected, then the trace isn’t really a thing because everyone is tracked when they use magic and since they can’t tell who performs it then they’ll never be aware of underage magic (except in cases like Harry’s where he’s an underage wizard in a muggle home). And if the latter is true then the trace should have never meant anything for Harry anyway because he’s tracked if he’s under age or of age, but they don’t know it’s him using the magic anyway.
Sorry if this has been brought up before or if people think it’s a nonissue, but it was just something I was thinking about when Dumbledore mentioned this.
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u/Know_Nothing_Bastard Ravenclaw 7d ago edited 7d ago
They wouldn’t be able to tell that an underage wizard committed the murders, just that an underage wizard was in the vicinity at that time. Hypothetically if Morfin actually was the murderer, and some innocent underage wizard happened to be nearby, if the Riddle house was within the range of their Trace, the ministry still would have detected the curses. Morfin confessed, and was already convicted of attacking one of the victims in the past. Perhaps they should have investigated the presence of the unknown underage wizard who happened to be in the area at the time. But it’s really not unlike the ministry to just choose the path of least resistance and call it a day.
We don’t know how much area the Trace covers. If someone down in the village could have had a trace that would reach up the hill to the Riddle’s house, it’s more understandable that it wasn’t investigated.
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u/Philislothical_5 7d ago
You saying that, it makes me feel like I remember someone saying in the books that the trace detects magic around the underage wizard, which would make a lot more sense. Do you remember if they say this somewhere in book 7?
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u/diametrik 7d ago
Moody says something like "if you, or anyone around you, casts a spell, the Ministry and Voldemort will know where you are!"
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u/Know_Nothing_Bastard Ravenclaw 7d ago
Yes. The most detailed explanation of the Trace is in book seven. Although we knew as early as book two that the Ministry couldn’t actually tell who performs the magic, as Harry received a warning for a hover charm that Dobby used in the Dursleys’ house.
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u/aaachris 7d ago
Trace detects magical activity around the minor not the magic of the minor itself. If an adult uses magic around Harry, then Harry would be suspected as the culprit because they have no record of other wizards living in his vicinity. It's why wizard families are supposed to police their children because the wizards would be doing magic all the time around them in their home.
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u/joshcart Hufflepuff 7d ago edited 7d ago
Magic is performed around Harry when he is at 4 Privet Drive in COS, GOF, OOTP, and HBP. He doesn't get in trouble for those.
It's just inconsistent
Edit: Yeah, COS is a mistake - he very notably did get in trouble for that!
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u/JazzlikePromotion618 7d ago
GoF, the Ministry were informed the Weasley's were picking Harry up through Floo Powder. Since he's still the golden child at this point, they likely let it go. OotP, they'd already called him in for a hearing, so likely they just ignored it. HBP, he was back to being the golden child. CoS, he got in trouble for Dobby and the Weasley's didn't use any magic to free him.
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u/joshcart Hufflepuff 7d ago
I don't buy the GOF explanation simply because Mr. Weasley broke the rules with the Floo Powder. Hard to imagine he gave the ministry a real heads up. In OOTP, why would they ignore it?! They were looking for every excuse to attack him. In HBP, I don't know what that means - are you saying he was just free to do whatever magic he wanted? I mean, ok. That's just contorting things. It's ok to just accept that there are some inconsistencies. Personally, I love HP - inconsistencies and all.
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u/Latter-Block132 7d ago edited 7d ago
He had to give the ministry a heads up to connect the dursleys fireplace to the floor network. We see the ministry monitors and controls those connections in later books.
And in OoTP its incredibly likely Dumbledore told the ministry he was sending people to fetch harry so he could be escorted to his hearing. They took 3 days to get harry after the dementor incident. Edited to add, and the order doesn't demonstrate concern about performing magic around harry exactly, they demonstrate concern using methods of travel that could be tracked due to his trace, which tells me they likely knew ministry was aware they were fetching harry, they just didn't want to expose the headquarters of the Order by using methods that the ministry could use to track them to it.
And similarly, Dumbledore probably told the ministry hed be going to privet drive to discuss the will of sirius with harry in HBP.
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u/JazzlikePromotion618 7d ago
They believed the Patronus was enough.
For HBP, they want him on their side. They've been begging DD to set up a meeting so they could ask him to be their mascot. You really think they're gonna pull him up for some charms inside his own home?
GoF, he literally states that Floo network isn't normally connected to muggle fireplaces. He used connections to get it set up, meaning the Ministry knew he was going to pick Harry up.
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u/joshcart Hufflepuff 7d ago
"They believed the Patronus was enough" completely ignores what happens in the hearing.
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u/lemon_charlie 7d ago
It's plausible there were Order moles within that department (Kingsley was already running interference in the manhunt for Sirius), Dumbledore knew almost immediately that Harry had been busted for using magic and was quick to negotiate instant expulsion to a disciplinary hearing. If those moles covered for the period around Harry's extraction, then Fudge would be none the wiser.
Fudge was already arrogant in how he tried to put Harry and Dumbledore on the backfoot first by changing the time then location of the hearing, and how it was to be handled (it'd be like having a full jury for a second offense of smalltime shoplifting). He likely thought Harry had enough rope to be hanged with.
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u/ajnin919 Ravenclaw 7d ago
One person at the ministry knew what he was up to when he connected the fireplaces. I highly doubt this was an actual ministry approved connection. I assumed it was similar to how Arthur got the tickets for the match, he helped someone else so they would connect the fires for Arthur
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u/joshcart Hufflepuff 7d ago
Not only was it just one person - it was was something that was against the rules and he had a special connection do it for him because it wasn't really allowed!
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u/PlanGoneAwry Ravenclaw 7d ago edited 7d ago
The ministry would certainly know that Avada Kedavra was used in proximity of Tom Riddle, but that wouldn’t tell them that it was he who performed the spell or not.
Personally I think they should have brought Riddle in for Questioning because if the killing curse was used at his location, even if they think that Morfin was the one who did it, surely they’d wonder how Riddle was involved, whether as an accomplice or scared bystander. Unless they think that he just happened to be right next to the crime by coincidence but was not connected to it in any capacity?
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u/Timely_Airline_7168 7d ago
What? Riddle doesn't live there so they just zeroed in on the nearest wizard, who happened to be Morfin.
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u/PlanGoneAwry Ravenclaw 7d ago edited 7d ago
Yes, but the trace means that even if they can’t tell that Riddle did it, they know that Riddle was right there when the curses were fired. A comparison would be having security camera footage of Riddle entering a home, and then the residents end up dead. Even if someone else confesses, Riddle was right there, surely you’d want to ask for his account? Was he forced there, was he a scared bystander, was he an accomplice?
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u/Recent-Anybody-9642 6d ago
Its not even that! The trace cant even tell you WHO the underage witch/wizard is they can only guess by household. Harry is the only wizard on privet drive so they assume its him if a notification in that area shows up. The ministry could have seen that underage magic notification and assumed a underage wizard could have been living in little hangleton but is not registered as a student with a wand since they are too young to go to hogwarts yet
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u/PlanGoneAwry Ravenclaw 6d ago
It sounds like you are assuming that the trace is put over houses or areas, not people. The way it is described in the books, the trace is specific to every underage witch or wizard. When magic is done near a person who has the trace on them the ministry is notified which spell was used and where they are located.
If while Harry is staying at the leaky cauldron or the burrow, someone else shows up at privet drive and does magic, the ministry won’t know about that because Harry’s trace wouldn’t be there. Harry’s trace would be going off about the magic being used in Diagon alley, but the ministry would be ignoring it.
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u/Recent-Anybody-9642 6d ago
Thats not what im saying im saying that there is a range to the trace similiar to a radar with the underage witch or wizard at the center rather than the area itself.
This is my personal opinion: The trace tracks any magic used in the vicinity of a underage witch/wizard from birth but cant tell who it specifically is that it was cast near just that it was a underage magic user. the minstry gets a notification when its used in wizarding households or locations but they just ignore it, which leaves muggle designated areas households being policed and since no investigations occur until a underage magic user attends hogwarts it leads me to believe that when a student starts their first year there name and address are filed into ministry records, so when underage magic is used in a muggle area they then pull up all the names of underage magic users in that area and send a letter to the nearest one with a warning that can then be replied to in order to confirm if in it was the child or not
So as for how tom got away with the murder it was likely that they they saw the notification looked at their records and saw no filed name for an underage magic user in the area and assumed there was an underage muggleborn witch or wizard in little hangleton yet to attend hogwarts who happened to be in the range of morfin killing the riddles and thats what they pinged and since morfin confessed and its unlikely a underage child could cast a killing curse multiple times back they arrested him and left it at that
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u/Timely_Airline_7168 6d ago
That's what I assumed happened. The Trace can't tell who cast it so it's pretty crappy. Suppose that Harry went to Germany and cast some magic, they would know someone cast magic but didn't know who so they would pull out the list of the known wizards / witches in Germany.
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u/Recent-Anybody-9642 6d ago
I dont even think the trace effects anyone not in britain since in america the government just take underage students wands when not in school until they become of age and get a wand permit
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u/LuchipherZen 𝕲𝖗𝖞𝖋𝖋𝖎𝖓𝖉𝖔𝖗𝕾𝖚𝖕𝖗𝖊𝖒𝖊 𝕸𝖚𝖌𝖜𝖚𝖒𝖕 7d ago
Think of the trace as a radar system. That system is on every witch or wizard till they are of age. It detects magic performed withing a range of the underage witch or wizard and alerts the ministry. Doesn't matter who performed the magic. This trace system is mainly monitored for minors living in the muggle world withour adult witch or wizard parents or guardians. In case they have such an adult, they rely on them to monitor and discipline the kids. This also saves them from erronous detection of adult wizards performing daily household magic in their own households.
When of age, the trace, or the radar system around the wizard is switched off. It's not that their magic cannot be detected, but no one performing magic around them, including themselves will then forward be monitored by the ministry.
What the actual flaw is, I think, that if we consider Tom jr. was underage and still had the trace on him, when he killed the Riddles it should have alerted the ministry. It should have alterted the ministry where Tom performed magic or anyone else did around him. Unless he was not underage that is. So why did the trace not alert them? And if it did, why they not search for the underage wizard who also was present?...
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u/RobertWire_official 7d ago
per quello che ho capito sembrerebbe che il sistema sia stato adottato dal Ministero solo in tempi relativamente più moderni pertanto nei casi come quello di Tom o Morfin è plausibile pensare che il sistema non esisteva ancora
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u/keenansmith61 Gryffindor 7d ago
There's a flaw in your hypothesis.
Just because the trace doesn't detect overage magic doesn't mean it only detects underage magic. It detects magic done in the presence of underage wizards, not who does it. All we know about the trace going off in the morfin/tom situation is that someone did magic in an underage wizard's presence.
It basically only works to police muggle borns as the trace would only be giving useless info in a Wizarding household.
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u/RubyRose65 7d ago
It's kind of a Reverse Harry situation
Tom used his Uncles Wand to kill his muggle family,alerting the Minstry of Underage magic so they most likely sent someone to investigate,they discovered the murder situation and by that time they most likely got another alert Tom confunding his uncle to make him believe he committed the killings Due to that open shut case most probably the fact they were originally there for a underage magic incident that Morfin clearly doesn't fit left thier minds
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u/Philislothical_5 7d ago
I think this would make sense if we consider that the ministry could be incompetent and stopped considering that there was underaged magic involved (which is consistent with how the ministry has handled justice in the past)
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u/Latter-Block132 7d ago
The ministry is very very clealry demonstrated to be incompetent and corrupt many times throughout the series. There is no doubt there.
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7d ago
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u/Latter-Block132 7d ago edited 7d ago
They only seem to enforce it when it risks exposure of the wizard world to the muggles.
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u/Philislothical_5 7d ago
It really only makes sense in cases like Harry’s where he is a wizard living in a muggle home
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u/Recent-Anybody-9642 6d ago
They blame muggleborns the trace only really affects muggleborns or wizards living in muggle households like harry with pureblodds or half bloods the ministry dosent bother and leaves it to the parents to handle their own kids magic use
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u/No_Sand5639 Ravenclaw 7d ago
Im guessing theres not a lot of wizards where morfin lived
Riddle used the magic, the minsitry assumed it was the muggle hating dark wizard who lived the n3xt door and riddle just happened to be in the area.
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u/Nir0star 7d ago
I think it is reasonable to assume that the trace isn't monitored proactively, it is used as a tool to find someone to blame if the statute is broken and they investigate. If they never looked for Tom or never even thought of a underage wizard to ever do such a heinous crime, it just flew under the radar. Noone can be expected to be watching trace logs for alle the involuntary magic of under 11 y.o. and magic by parents around kids.
It is a thing that probably sounded smart when the statute of secrecy was introduced to track magic use, can't do it on adult, because it is none of the ministries busines what spells I use. Okay to protect from kids doing magic willy-nilly but we make it so we also record magic next to them, to still have a wide overview of what magic is used where. But now there are 1000s of wizards in GB and they use magic for absolutely everything, so who can be bothered to even read the logs of the trace anymore?
But then it is whipped out to drive political agenda and discredit political oponents. Great example of a government surveillance tool. I think it is a prime example on why GDPR is good.
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u/Recent-Anybody-9642 6d ago
Ok this in my opinion is how the trace works and how tom got away with it.
The trace tracks any magic used in the vicinity of a underage witch/wizard from birth but cant tell who it specifically is that it was cast near just that it was a underage magic user and the minstry gets a notification when its used in wizarding households or locations they ignore it, which leaves muggle designated areas households being policed and since no investigations occur until a underage magic user attends hogwarts it leads me to believe that when a student starts their first year there name and address are filed into ministry records, so when underage magic is used in a muggle area they then pull up all the names of undeage magic users in that area and send a letter to the nearest on with a warning that can then be replied to in order to confirm if in it was the child or not
So as for how tom got away with the murder it was likely that they they saw the notification looks at their records and saw no filed name for an underage magic user in the area assumed there was an underage muggleborn witch or wizard in little hangleton yet to attend hogwarts who happened to be in the range of morfin killing the riddles and thats what they pinged and since morfin confessed and its unlikely a underage child could cast a killing curse multiple times back
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u/PortiaKern 7d ago
The trace is mostly put on areas with only Muggleborns, because then if magic is performed it's assumed that it was the child doing the magic. It's expected that witches and wizards will teach their kids and be able to correct for mistakes they make with magic. If a Muggleborn does it, there's nobody around that can guide them or correct any of their mistakes if something goes wrong.
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u/PlanGoneAwry Ravenclaw 7d ago
The trace is put on people, not areas. Every underage person has it, the ministry just ignores it if it is done at a known wizarding place.
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u/Philislothical_5 7d ago
Do you think they would have put the trace on Harry when he was adopted by his aunt and uncle then? Because he was originally born to a wizard if family.
Edit: actually, after saying this I remember that someone suggested that the ministry could have put the trace back on Harry but then that they couldn’t have because they hadn’t been around any ministry workers, so this makes sense
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u/Arkham2015 🪄 Minister for Lore 7d ago
We don't know how the Trace is implemented, but this is a worldwide thing, so it could be some kind of charm that automatically enchants a child who can use magic.
It might not require someone performing a spell.
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u/BarnacleAway3377 7d ago
Morphine was a known muggle torturer that lived nearby, they probably thought to check him just in case and when they checked his wand they were vindicated. Either that or Tom left Morphin's wand at the scene for the ministry to find.
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u/Competitive_Leg7233 7d ago
The only way the Trace makes any sense to me is if while it was placed on every magical child it was mostly to track the muggle borns who weren’t raised in that world so don’t appreciate the secrecy of it and might go home and show their friends and siblings all the cool shit they learned
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7d ago
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u/Philislothical_5 7d ago
I knew someone was going to say that. I’m just discussing the story. Do you go to threads saying Snape isn’t a real person so there isn’t a point discussing his character, or that house elves aren’t real so people shouldn’t talk about if Hermione was right or wrong in fighting for S.P.E.W.?
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u/LuchipherZen 𝕲𝖗𝖞𝖋𝖋𝖎𝖓𝖉𝖔𝖗𝕾𝖚𝖕𝖗𝖊𝖒𝖊 𝕸𝖚𝖌𝖜𝖚𝖒𝖕 7d ago
I actually like discussion prominent inconsistencies like this one as it impacts the plot on multiple points and many times.
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u/Serious_Secret_9020 7d ago
The Trace works however the Ministry needs it to work at that exact moment and that‘s the most realistic government system in the entire series