Why Harry DROPPED the Resurrection Stone in the Forbidden Forest - Harry Potter Explained

Hey everyone,

Welcome to another installment of Harry Potter Theory. In this video, we’re going to be addressing a question that many facts have likely asked themselves - and that is, why on earth did Harry just drop the resurrection stone in the forbidden forest? After he had possession of it, why didn’t he hold on to it for longer?

In the following excerpt, Harry confirms with Dumbledore that he left the stone in the forest, and that he has no interesting in returning for it:

“The thing that was hidden in the Snitch,” he began, “I dropped in the forest. I don't know exactly where, but I'm not going to go looking for it again. Do you agree?”

“My dear boy, I do,” said Dumbledore, while his fellow pictures looked confused and curious. “A wise and courageous decision, but no less than I would have expected of you. Does anyone else know where it fell?”

“No one,” said Harry, and Dumbledore nodded his satisfaction.

The resurrection is of course one of the fabled Deathly Hallows, stemming from the tale of the three brothers- Antioch, Cadmus and Ignotus.
The brothers were all members of the famous Peverell family. The plot surrounds the three wizard brothers and their ability to cheat death for a short period of time. After conquering death, a personification of death, under the guise of congratulating them, awarded them with 3 gifts: The elder wand, the resurrection stone, and the invisibility cloak. Long story short, each brother chose one of the gifts that death had presented them. Ignotus (the youngest) chose the invisibility cloak, Cadmus (the middle brother) chose the resurrection stone, and Antioch (the eldest) chose the elder wand.

From the tale of the three brothers:

"Then the second brother, who was an arrogant man, decided that he wanted to humiliate Death still further, and asked for the power to recall others from Death. So Death picked up a stone from the riverbank and gave it to the second brother, and told him that the stone would have the power to bring back the dead."

We see Harry let it ‘slip from his fingers’ in the following passage from chapter 34 of the Deathly Hallows:

“I thought he would come,” said Voldemort in his high, clear voice, his eyes on the leaping flames. “I expected him to come.”
Nobody spoke. They seemed as scared as Harry, whose heart was now throwing itself against his ribs as though determined to escape the body he was about to cast aside. He hands were sweating as he pulled off the Invisibility Cloak and stuffed it beneath his robes, with his wand. He did not want to be tempted to fight.

“I was, it seems . . . mistaken,” said Voldemort.

“You weren’t.”
Harry said it as loudly as he could, with all the force he could muster. He did not want to sound afraid. The Resurrection Stone slipped from between his numb fingers, and out of the corner of his eyes he saw his parents, Sirius, and Lupin vanish as he stepped forward into the firelight. At that moment he felt that nobody mattered but Voldemort. It was just the two of them.

So, you may ask, why would Harry simply ‘drop’ an artifact created by death himself? The stone, after all is “said to be the only object that would bring back the spirits of the holder's deceased loved ones, activating when turned three times in the user's hand.”

Seems like a lot of Power.

Harry of course uses it to summon the images of his mother and father. While the stone was initially thought to bring back the dead, in reality it only brings back a ‘shade’ of these people. It has been expressed that the shades produced are ‘less substantial than living bodies, but much more than ghosts’, and Harry even went on to describe them as Transparent- producing a Patronus like effect that helped shield him against Dementors. Essentially, the stones inability to properly cheat death was Death’s way of punishing the arrogant Peverell brother. It just gave people a sample of what it would be like to be reunited with these people, and in Cadmus’s case, he killed himself to be with the girl that he loved once more.

JK Rowling would later add, when asked about whether or not the stone would ever be found:

J.K. Rowling: "I think not. I imagine that it was squashed into the ground by a centaur's hoof as the centaurs dashed to the aid of the Hogwarts fighters, and thereafter became buried."

And that’s it for this video! I hope that helps to address the question of WHY Harry would just drop the stone. If you enjoy the content please like the video and subscribe to the channel.

Until next time,
YER A WIZARD ARRY
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Видео Why Harry DROPPED the Resurrection Stone in the Forbidden Forest - Harry Potter Explained канала Harry Potter Theory