Essay: The Spirit of the Emperor

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire begins in a setting that does not, at first, seem to include Harry. The opening description of Little Hangleton is similar to the introduction of the town of Pagford in The Casual Vacancy, JK Rowling’s first post-Potter novel. The village in Goblet of Fire is also a conservative, hide-bound outpost of prejudice and social stratification; in this village, a man accused of murder fifty years earlier is still a pariah, tormented by teenage vandals, forever guilty in the court of public opinion, despite a lack of evidence linking him to the murders of his former employers.

The village pub in Little Hangleton is THE HANGED MAN, the name of the twelfth card in the Tarot Major Arcana and the third sequential card for Goblet of Fire, the group of three cards, in order, aligned with this book. (The first nine cards, in three groups of three, were aligned with the first three books in the series.)  This is the first overt mention of a Tarot card in the seven books; there was abundant evidence in the first three books that JK Rowling was aligning the vertical columns of the Major Arcana with each book—due to the High Priestess being at the top of the second column, with her open book (see Quantum Harry, the Podcast, Episode 33: The Inverted Tower of Secrets), and the Wheel of Fortune card aligning with the book in which Harry begins to study Divination, among other things. (See Quantum Harry, the Podcast, Episode 35: Prisoner of Time.) Calling the Little Hangleton pub the The Hanged Man implies that she is also aligning each book with the sequential cards for each book, since the Hanged Man is in the fourth set of three cards and she names it explicitly. The only other card she mentions in the series—the Lightning-Struck Tower, in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince—is also named in the book that corresponds with where that card falls in the sequential cards. (It is the first card in the sixth set of three cards, the set of three aligning with the sixth book.)

Frank Bryce, de facto caretaker of the Riddle House, is a Hanged Man in his community, a presumed traitor to the Riddles and persona non grata, which shows that the twelfth card of the Major Arcana would be an apt description for him even if it were not the name of the village pub. This is just one way in which Tarot relates to the fourth book of the Harry Potter series.

In our grid of twenty-one Tarot Major Arcana cards, laid out in three rows and seven columns, the column of cards aligning with the fourth book, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, has the Emperor, #4, at the top, Strength, #11, in the middle row, and the Moon, #18, at the bottom. When the Emperor was the first sequential card for the second book, Arthur Weasley, an archetypal Father, embodied the Emperor archetype in that book, which is equivalent to the Father archetype. (See Quantum Harry, the Podcast, Episode 34: Emperors, Fools, and Angels.) He was largely responsible for acquainting Harry with the wizarding world outside of the scope of the first book. Now Harry is exposed to even more of wizarding society, learning about other countries and schools, coming into contact with witches and wizards from those countries, with their own governments and laws. 

This fits with the number four, the Emperor’s number, also being the number that has governed how humans describe the world—North, South, East and West. It is the number of the major regions of the British Isles at the time Hogwarts was founded: England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales, which also align with the four Hogwarts Houses. (See Quantum Harry, the Podcast, Episode 18: The Wide World.) The number four is associated with the four seasons, four elements, the four Evangelists, the four suits of the Tarot Minor Arcana, and so on. Four is used to describe the world and is a number of completion. It is therefore appropriate that Harry is the fourth Triwizard Champion, making the roster more complete than when there were only three, though that would usually seem to be a complete set of Champions for a competition called The Triwizard Tournament.

Like Arthur Weasley, a literal and archetypal Father, Cedric is an archetypal Father as well, and thus also embodies the Emperor archetype. (See Quantum Harry, the Podcast, Episode 5: Our Father.) The spirit of the Emperor colors the entire fourth book. The war-imagery on this card is important: rams’ heads are on the arms of his throne on some cards, which links the Emperor to the astrological sign of Aries, as well as linking the Emperor to the Greek god Ares, the god of war, known as Mars in Roman mythology. In the first book, Harry and Hagrid grow increasingly impatient with Centaurs who repeat, “Mars is bright tonight,” over and over. This was clearly meant to indicate the advent of war.

The Emperor is the first of the three sequential cards aligned with the second book, when Hogwarts is under attack from the Basilisk; in the fourth book, which is ruled by the Emperor, Mars is not just bright but flaming hot. War is no longer just on the horizon: war is here.

As the epitome of the Emperor in Goblet of Fire, Cedric, a sixth-year Hufflepuff, is painted in broad, grand terms: he is handsome, the captain of and Seeker on his house Quidditch team (which Harry will also be in his sixth year), a prefect, and the son of a Ministry official. Cedric has conquered the world of school academically, athletically and socially. He is popular with faculty and students. The Goblet of Fire itself rules that he is the best person who put his own name into the Goblet to be Hogwarts Champion in the Triwizard Tournament.

The Emperor card (#4) is numerically linked to the Fool (which, when it is numbered at all is labeled #22), hovering above the grid of twenty-one cards. Many depictions of the twenty-two cards in the Major Arcana show most of them in a three-by-seven grid with the Fool in its own row, right above the Emperor. In the Harry Potter books, the Fool is often embodied by Peeves, though Arthur Weasley also had a Fool/Emperor aspect in Chamber of Secrets.  (See Quantum Harry, the Podcast, Episode 34: Emperors, Fools and Angels.) However, in Goblet of Fire, the Fool is often embodied by Harry. Shakespeare depicted close, symbiotic relationships between kings and their Fools, who are almost like “shadow kings”, responsible for advice that may take their countries into war or alliances that change the course of history. The superficially derogatory term “fool” belies how valuable this person is to the ruler, how much wisdom is brought to the job of the Fool.

King Lear and the Fool in the Storm by William Dyce (1806-1864), oil on canvas, circa 1851

When Harry’s name comes out of the Goblet after everyone believes that the Champions have all been named, he becomes a “shadow Champion”, Hogwarts’ second Champion. Draco Malfoy was unlikely to be the only one who considered Cedric to be the “real” Hogwarts Champion; everyone in Hufflepuff no doubt felt that the “real” Hogwarts Champion came from their house.

In Goblet of Fire, Cedric embodies the Father archetype, which rules the book, and is the character best embodying this archetype in the book. Harry, the protagonist, steps into his shoes during the climax, which he does with all of the characters who best embody the ruling archetype in each book. (See Quantum Harry, the Podcast, Episode 5: Our Father.) Cedric also embodies the Emperor, the ruling Tarot archetype for the fourth book. It is fitting that someone who bears the title of “Champion” should play this role, since a king or emperor should be a Champion for his people.

At first Harry feels like a Fool and a pretender to the “Champion” title, living in Cedric’s shadow, including learning that Cho Chang, whom he had hoped to take to the Yule Ball, is going with the “real” Champion. Harry becoming the second Hogwarts Champion comes out of the blue, like the actions of the archetypal Fool, who does not fit into the grid of twenty-one cards. (See Quantum Harry, the Podcast, Episode 30: Harry and Tarot.) Harry could no more have predicted his name coming out of the Goblet, since he did not put it in, than he could have predicted the Tournament cup being a Portkey.

The Death card (#13) is also linked to the Emperor (since 1+3=4), and this is how Cedric’s reign ends: with Death. As a loyal retainer, a royal Fool (in the best sense), Harry brings Cedric’s body back to Hogwarts after fighting valiantly as Cedric’s “second”, effectively. Harry uses the Disarming Charm against Voldemort, which some might consider the act of a Fool, to not go for the kill. It is also the act of an anti-soldier, one of Harry’s chief roles, a key part of his being a holy man and intercessor throughout the series.

The middle column card, Strength or Force, #11, shows a woman holding a lion’s jaws open, bending it to her will. The figure on this card takes control, as Harry must to survive the Tournament. As a Gryffindor, he could be the lion or the woman; he repeatedly takes steps to control situations in this book, using his broom in the first task, and attempting to save all of the hostages in the lake, which was considered the act of a Fool. He asks Cho and then Parvati to the Ball; he takes the cup with Cedric; and he steps out from behind a tombstone, casting the Disarming Charm, of all things, against Voldemort’s Killing Curse. Harry’s choices show his strength of character, which is why his wand, when linked to Voldemort’s, forces the other wand to produce shadows of its previous spells.

The shadows that emerge from Voldemort’s wand bring to mind the Judgment card, #20, which is numerically linked to Strength (1+1=2 and 2+0=2). The Judgment card shows the dead being resurrected, but when the shades of Cedric, James and Lily Potter and Frank Bryce appear, they are judging, not judged; they judge Voldemort, they distract him and this helps Harry to escape.

The other card linked to Strength is the High Priestess (#2, because 1+1=2). This Tarot archetype is again embodied by Ginny, but not just Ginny. Parvati is also an archetypal Maiden, like Ginny (see Quantum Harry, the Podcast, Episode 3: Iron Maiden) , who goes to the ball with Neville and does the same things as Harry’s date Parvati. This includes meeting up with a boy from Ravenclaw, while Parvati meets with a boy from “virtual” Ravenclaw, the French school, Beauxbatons. This parallel structure foreshadows Harry’s and Ginny’s eventual relationship in the sixth book and makes her growing friendship with Harry in the fifth book possible.

The center cards in the first three columns—Justice, the Hermit, and the Wheel— were intercessors between the top and bottom cards in those columns, and Harry’s Strength/Force is the intercessor between the darkness of the bottom card, the Moon (#18) and the top card, the Emperor (#4), which is chiefly embodied by Cedric. The Moon is an omen of dark times but is also important for the series’ overall structure as well as applying to details in the fourth book.

The lobster or scorpion emerging from water in the foreground on this card felt like a symbol for Snape in the previous book, pursuing the dog and the wolf also depicted on the card, embodied in the third book by Sirius and Remus. (See Quantum Harry, the Podcast, Episode 36: Chariots of Justice.) However in the fourth book, for no obvious reason—or rather, no other obvious reason—JK Rowling introduces Blast-Ended Skrewts. The creature on the card looks remarkably the way the text describes a Skrewt, which are at first small, disgusting things, but later a monster-sized lobsterish creature Harry confronts in the last task’s maze. There are again towers in the distance on the Moon card, looking rather like a castle, but also looking a bit like tombstones in a graveyard, where Cedric meets his fate and Harry confronts Voldemort.

The Moon is a fitting symbol for the fourth book because it functions as a mirror in the series, as the moon reflects sunlight; there are many inversions between the second and sixth books, the first and seventh books, and the third and fifth books. Likewise, many elements are mirrored between the beginning and end of this book. At the beginning, Harry takes a Portkey with Cedric Diggory to a wizarding competition (the Quidditch World Cup) that at one point includes Death Eaters. At the end, Harry takes a Portkey with Cedric from a wizarding competition that also has an international flavor: the Triwizard Tournament. Harry encounters Death Eaters in the graveyard, but rather than seeing the Dark Mark, conjured using his wand at the World Cup camp, he encounters the human incarnation of the Dark Mark: Voldemort. The Dark Mark was conjured by one servant of Voldemort, Barty, Jr., while it is as if Voldemort was conjured by another servant: Peter Pettigrew. 

Rowling has used mirrored book structures before, notably in the first book, when representatives of the seven obstacles to the Philosopher’s Stone are introduced earlier in the book in reverse order. (See Quantum Harry, the Podcast, Episode 28: The Grimm Campaign.) This structure is particularly fitting in the central book of the series, with the Moon card at the bottom of the column of Major Arcana cards ruling the book.

The Moon is also connected to sleep and dreams. The opening scene at the Riddle House in Little Hangleton is witnessed by Harry while he seems to be dreaming, though he really sees it as it is happening due to the link between him and Voldemort, because Harry is the accidental Horcrux. The Moon represents a dark night of the soul, watery and mysterious, dangerous and scary. This points to the resurrection of Voldemort, someone who is the opposite of the Emperor, a symbol of civilized order, which Voldemort wants to topple.

Linked to the Moon (#18) is the Hermit (#9, because 1+8=9). This wandering mendicant, wearing what could be an invisibility cloak, might point to Barty Crouch, Jr., the imposter who pretends to be Mad-Eye Moody, the ex-Auror hired by Dumbledore to be the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher in Harry’s fourth year. Barty Jr. hides under an Invisibility Cloak at the World Cup, though he is usually more of a home-bound hermit, hiding under this cloak in his father’s house. Now he is out in the world, like the card’s wandering Hermit. During most of the book he uses Polyjuice Potion as a cloak, to hide his true identity, and despite being an imposter, teaches the students some useful things, the light of the Hermit’s lantern being a symbol of wisdom. (Barty Crouch, Jr. was accomplished academically; he received twelve OWLs, like Bill and Percy Weasley.)

The Hermit card could point to two people: Barty Crouch, Jr. and the man he displaced, Alastor “Mad-Eye” Moody, described as an eccentric loner, as Hermits often are: alone, paranoid, but also possessing a store of valuable wisdom. Moody was returning to the world when he accepted Dumbledore’s job offer, but Barty Crouch, Jr. did this instead, relegating Moody to the shadowy, hermit-like existence he formerly endured at his father’s home.

The fourth set of sequential cards, aligned with Goblet of Fire, are cards 10, 11 and 12: the Wheel of Fortune (#10); Strength, (#11), which is also a column card; and the Hanged Man (#12).

The Wheel of Fortune reflected Harry’s up-and-down fortunes in the previous book, when it was the center of the third column; Harry hardly ever seemed in control until he overcame his desire to hear his parents’ voices and conjured a Patronus that saved him, Hermione and Sirius. His fortunes rise and fall again in quick succession in the fourth book, but the double influence of card #11, Strength, points to his having better control now. He is less at the whim of fortune, handling what fate throws at him with confidence, even when he is caught out of his dormitory with his golden egg.

Another link between the Wheel card and this book is that a sphinx rules over the Wheel. Like Oedipus, Harry answers a riddle posed by a sphinx in the maze during the last task, and, like Oedipus, he desires an archetypal Mother (Cho Chang) and contributes to her partner’s death, the archetypal Father Cedric Diggory. (See Quantum Harry, the Podcast, Episode 5: Our Father.) Unlike the father of Oedipus, Harry is not caught up in a fate he enacts while trying to avoid it; that is Voldemort’s role.

The Wheel (#10) is linked to the Magician (#1, because 1+0=1) and to the Sun (#19, because 1+9=10 and again 1+0=1). The Sun card is associated with the phoenix; some modern decks have Sun cards depicting a phoenix. Phoenixes were also associated with the temple of the Sun god at Heliopolis, which means "City of the Sun". (See Quantum Harry, the Podcast, Episode 14: The Devil’s Game.)

A Sun card depicting a phoenix (not in the public doman).

Source: Pinterest

During Harry’s duel with Voldemort, Harry is thoroughly master of his wand, like an archetypal Magician (#1) and like someone channeling the formidable woman on the Strength card (#11). The linked wands, which both have phoenix-feather cores, create a golden cage of light resonating with phoenix-song, as if channeling sunlight. As a result, the last four people killed by Voldemort’s wand—Cedric, James, Lily, and Frank Bryce—appear in the graveyard, virtual resurrections, foreshadowing Harry using the Resurrection Stone before he walks into the forest to die.

During the final task Harry becomes Master of the four elements of fire, air, water and earth, and master of the four corners of the earth, symbolized by the maze growing on the Quidditch pitch but also in his mastery of the “point me” charm, a compass spell he uses to navigate the maze. By doing this he becomes master of the cardinal directions and finally embodies the Emperor, having evolved into a true Champion, not just a shadow Champion/Fool, as well as the archetypal Magician, master of the four Tarot suits linking that card to the four elements, four cardinal directions and four Hogwarts houses, which is fitting for a true Hogwarts Champion.

The column and sequential cards for this book intersect at #11, Strength, creating a cross in the grid of cards. This is appropriate for Goblet of Fire because Harry is symbolically crucified in the graveyard when he is bound to a tombstone. However, it is not the time for him to submit to literal death; that will come in Deathly Hallows. His use of the Disarming Charm in the graveyard foreshadows how he ultimately defeats his enemy and is an echo of Viktor Krum’s sacrifice play in the Quidditch World Cup at the beginning of Goblet of Fire, which is in turn an echo of Ron’s sacrifice during the life-sized chess game, the fourth obstacle to the Philosopher’s Stone, which aligns with the fourth book. (See Quantum Harry, the Podcast: Episode 19: Not Playing to Win.)

The Hanged Man points to another symbolic but temporary crucifixion. As with many things mirrored at the beginning and end of the book, there are characters who embody the Hanged Man at each “end” of the story. Frank Bryce, the loyal Riddle family servant, was the most likely suspect when the Riddle family was killed, though Muggle authorities could not build a case against him. The Hanged Man, also called “The Traitor”–Il Traditore in medieval Italian decks—shows a figure hanging upside down, which was called “baffling”, an Italian punishment for traitors. Frank was considered a traitor to the Riddles. In Jung and Tarot: An Archetypal Journey, Sallie Nichols writes that hanging a traitor upside down “...is a mark of ignominy, of censure and public ridicule.” [p. 216] This was not unlike crucifixion under Roman rule; the imagery on this Tarot card is also associated with St. Peter, who was crucified upside-down.

The Hanged Man at the end of the book is Harry, who witnesses Frank’s murder at the beginning through his connection to Voldemort. Like Frank, who reappears as a ghostly figure, Harry is upside-down compared to the rest of the world; he knows he did not put his name in the Goblet, but most people do not believe him. He is also literally upside down at one point in the hedge maze, another image from a Tarot card that figures in the last task (the others being the Skrewt-like creature on the Moon card and the Sphinx on the Wheel card).

Frank Bryce knows he did not kill the Riddles but no one believes him. Unlike Frank, Harry does not die. This is another case of the Moon as a magical mirror, flipping elements at the book’s start and finish. And while the Hanged Man is significant in Goblet of Fire, it is even more so in Order of the Phoenix, when it is the middle column card for that book. Harry’s inability to convince Fudge of Voldemort’s return prepare the reader for his almost-constant inverted state during the fifth book of the series, when he is the Hanged Man incarnate.

Cards linked to the Hanged Man (#12) are the Empress (#3 – because 1+2=3) and the World (#21, because 2+1=3). Again playing the Empress, Hermione prepares Harry for the Triwizard Tournament tasks. Cho Chang also embodies the Empress, an archetypal Mother desired by Harry, which Hermione is not, Rita Skeeter’s muckraking notwithstanding. (See Quantum Harry, the Podcast, Episode 4: Mother, May I? and Episode 5: Our Father.)

The World card, whose figure holds two wands, is key during the climax of the fourth book, when the cage of golden light vibrates with phoenix-song and Harry is master over his own wand and in control of Voldemort’s. The linked brother-wands represent another moment of wholeness and completion for Harry, as well as foreshadowing Harry being master over both his and his enemy’s wands at the climax of the seventh book in the series.

In the previous essay, I began to write about how, in the three “middle” books of the series—Prisoner of Azkaban, Goblet of Fire, and Order of the Phoenix—the Tarot cards aligned with each book help to illuminate the relationships between seven alignments that occur in each of these three books, another case of a three-by-seven grid, like the grid of Tarot Major Arcana cards numbered one to twenty-one. To recap, these alignments are: 1- a Horcrux aligned with each book; 2 – the DADA teacher for the book; 3 – the non-Gryffindor house aligned with each book; 4 – the element aligned with that house; 5 – the Marauder aligned with each book; 6 – the member of the Trio aligned with each book; and 7 – the non-Harry Champion aligned with each book (the Champion of whom the Trio-member was jealous).

In Prisoner of Azkaban, the Tarot cards that help to illuminate JK Rowling’s narrative choices also illuminate the alignments for that book: the Empress card points to the diadem Horcrux; the Hermit card points to the aptness of Remus Lupin being the DADA teacher; both the Empress and the Justice card point to Ravenclaw being the non-Gryffindor house; Justice, linked to the astrological sign of Libra, an Air sign, points to Air being the element for third book; the Moon card links to Remus Lupin being the Marauder aligned with the third book; the Empress points to Hermione being the member of the Trio aligned with this book; and the Empress and Star point to Fleur Delacour, of whom Hermione was jealous and who wears a diadem/tiara at her wedding, being the non-Harry Champion aligned with this book.

Hufflepuff’s Cup is the Horcrux aligned with Goblet of Fire, which is somewhat obvious due to the “goblet” in the title, and Cedric, the “real Hogwarts champion”, being from Hufflepuff. However, there are many other cups and virtual cups in the book. There is the Tournament cup Harry takes with Cedric. The Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, Barty Crouch, Jr., the second alignment, carries a flask (a kind of cup) with Polyjuice potion to maintain his disguise as Mad-Eye Moody. This is not the only link between the Cup Horcrux and Barty, Jr. When Harry goes into Dumbledore’s Pensieve (another large cup) Harry sees Barty Crouch, Jr. on trial at the Ministry with Bellatrix Lestrange, her husband, and brother-in-law. And where does Harry find the cup Horcrux in the seventh book? In the Lestrange vault at Gringotts.

Dumbledore uses a Pensieve to “reflect” on memories. Memory is also linked to the Moon, a key tie between Barty, Jr., the Lestranges, and Hufflepuff’s cup. The fourth column of cards has the Emperor at the top and Moon at the bottom. The gang of four that was Barty Jr. and the Lestranges went to prison for torturing the parents of Neville Longbottom (an archetypal Father/Emperor) so severely that they lost their memories. Neville, who embodies the same archetypes as Cedric, is also linked to Hufflepuff: he excels at Herbology, taught by the head of Hufflepuff, Professor Sprout, whom he will eventually succeed, and his future spouse is the Hufflepuff Hannah Abbot.

Rowling reveals in the sixth book that Voldemort acquired Hufflepuff’s cup to turn it into a Horcrux by altering the memory of a house-elf to so she believed she had killed her mistress. The Moon card, a mirror to the Sun and the entire series, as well as symbolically linked to dreams and memory, links the Cup to this book and to Barty Crouch, Jr., who also sees Dumbledore, McGonagall and Snape coming for him in Mad-Eye’s “foe glass”, another non-mirroring mirror, one of many that appear throughout the series.

The third alignment, due to the cup Horcrux, but not that alone, is the house for this book: Hufflepuff. At the Leaving Feast, Dumbledore lifts his cup to a Hufflepuff, the Father/Emperor figure Cedric Diggory, and bids us all to remember. The moon, memories, Hufflepuffs and virtual Hufflepuffs, cups and a DADA teacher who stole the Longbottoms’ memories are all linked indelibly to the Moon card at the bottom of the column for this book. It reappears as a sequential card in the sixth, which is the next time Harry will explore Dumbledore’s memories, this time with permission.

The fourth alignment, the element for this book, is Earth, the element for Hufflepuff. James Potter, another archetypal Father/Emperor, reappears at the end of the book as a shadow emerging from Voldemort’s wand. He is the Marauder aligned with this book, the fifth alignment. Finally, Harry himself is the member of the Trio aligned with the central book in the series, and Cedric is the Champion of whom he was jealous, the sixth and seventh alignments.

Earth is not only the element of Hufflepuff but of the final task, held in a hedge maze grown in the earth of the Quidditch pitch. It is the element of death and graveyards, where Harry and Cedric go via the Tournament cup. James, Harry’s father, is a doppelgänger for Cedric; they are both Father/Emperor archetypes, and Cedric’s death is a re-enactment of James Potter’s death.

All of these alignments are easiest to discern through examining the Tarot cards linked to this book, especially the Emperor and Moon, the top and bottom cards in the fourth column of Major Arcana cards, the one aligning with the fourth book of the series: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.

Adapted from the script for Quantum Harry, the Podcast, Episode 37: The Goblet of Memory. Copyright 2017-2019 by Quantum Harry Productions and B.L. Purdom. See other posts on this blog for direct links to all episodes of Quantum Harry.

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