The Pensieve!

SPOILER WARNING: this page contains book 5 content

*Special thanks to Paula (The Pensieve content writer) for help with this page

Pick a section:
- Introduction
- Entering the building
- General information
- Floor Plan: Departments and Committees

Note: all information is correct as of the end of book 5

Introduction:

The Ministry of Magic is the wizard government. It is probably the largest employer in Britain's wizarding community.

Entering the building:

It is located underground, in the centre of London. Most witches and wizards either apparate or use floo powder to reach the Ministry. Others use the Visitor's Entrance which is a derilect, red telephone box which stands before heavily graffitied wall in on a street that houses a few shabby-looking offices, a pub and an overflowing skip. Such a location is very inconspicious to the Muggle eye (thus arousing no suspicion). Once inside the telephone box, you dial the number '6-2-4-4-2' (which spells 'magic'). A cool female voice welcomes you (the visitor) to the Ministry and requests your name and business, following which a square silver badge stating this information lands in the telephone chute where one usually receives one's change. The telephone box then descends into the ground, opening at the Atrium of the Ministry of Magic.

The Atrium is a huge, magnificent hall. It is very long, and has a highly polished, dark wood floor. The ceiling is peackock blue and inlaid with gleaming golden symbols that keep changing and moving like a noticeboard. There are many gilded fireplaces set into the shiny, dark wood panelled walls. Witches and Wizards are constantly arriving through (or setting of from) the fireplaces by floo powder. There are many Apparition points along the hall. Halfway down the hall, stands the Fountain of Magical Brethren. The fountain feature comprises of a number of life-like figures in the middle of a circular pool littered with coins (proceeds go to St. Mungo's): a noble-looking wizard with his hand pointing to the sky, a beautiful witch; and three figures that stare up adoringly at both of them - a centaur, goblin and house-elf. Though the fountain is supposed to be symbol of wizarding society, only the house-elf's expression is likely to be accurate - illustrating the arrogance of both wizardkind and humankind. Glittering jets of water shoot from different parts of the statue into the fountain's pool below.

To reach the Departments in the Ministry, a visitor must first go through the Security desk which stands before a set of golden gates. Eric the watch-wizard mans the Security desk, analysing wands with a scale-like contraption.

At least twenty lifts (elevators) stand beyond the gate, all with wrought golden grilles. The lifts descend to various floors, each housing different deparments.

General information:

There are ten floors in the Ministry of Magic. The lifts reach eight of them. The 10th level (bottom floor) can only be reached from a staircase on the 9th level, the Department of Mysteries. It is dungeon-like and houses the sinister Courtroom 10 - the huge, stone chamber where the Death Eaters were tried.

Paper aeroplanes whizz around each floor and in the lifts, delivering inter-departmental memos to Ministry employes.

Although the Ministry of Magic is underground, there are plenty of windows through which stream sunlight and air. The windows are enchanted by Magical Maintence, who decide which weather the building should get each day. According to Mr Weasley, they had two months of hurricanes last time the committee was wanting a pay-rise.

Minister for Magic:

Present Minister for Magic: Cornelius Fudge (c.1990's-1996?) - it's likely Fudge will be forced to resign following his oversight of the second rise of Voldemort
Senior Undersecretary to the Minister: Dolores Umbridge
Junior Undersecretary & Personal assistant to the Minister: Percy Weasley
Previous Minister of Magic: Millicent Bagnold (c. 1970's & 80's)
Previous Minister of Magic: Grogan Stump (c. 1811)
Bulgarian Minister of Magic: Mr Obalonsk

Groud Floor: Visitor's entrance (telephone box)

Level 1: not specified

Level 2: Department of Magical Law Enforcement

The biggest department in the Ministry. All the departments are directly or indirectly answerable to this one - with perhaps the exception of the Department of Mysteries.

Head: Amelia Bones. Barty Crouch Sr. was head of this department during the Voldemort years

- Sub-departments:

>> Improper Use of Magic Office

Head: Mafalda Hopkirk
Other personnel: unknown
Incorporates:
Committee on Experimental Charms:
Personnel: Gilbert Whimple

>> Auror (Dark Wizard catchers) Headquarters
Head: unknown
Other personnel: Kingsley Shacklebolt, Nymphadora Tonks; Alastor Moody (past), Frank Longbottom (past), Alice Longbottom (past)
Extra info: The Auror Headquarters are located through a pair of heavy oak doors. Headquarters consists of a cluttered open area, divided into cubicles (covered in anything from Quidditch posters, family photos, newspaper clippings or wanted witch/wizard signs). The area's usually buzzing with a fair amount of activity. Kingsely's cubicle is covered with Sirius pictures as he's been put in charge of the hunt for Sirius (an ideal appointment from the Order's point of view).

>> Wizengamot Administration Services
Head (Chief Witch/Warlock): Albus Dumbledore (replaced briefly by Cornelius Fudge in 1995/96)
Other personnel: Wizengamot court judges (there are +-50) - Cornelius Fudge; Dolores Umbridge; Percy Weasley (Court Scribe); Tiberius Odgen; Griselda Marchbanks; rest unknown.
Extra info: The Wizengamot is the Wizarding Court of Law - they act as a jury, voting and passing judgements on cases. Depending on the severity of the case, a full court (of +- 50) or a smaller jury may be used.

>> Magical Law Enforcment Patrol
Head: unknown
Other personnel: unknown
Extra info: Equivalent of an ordinary police force - where as Aurors are more like special detectives or agents

>> Misuse of Muggle Artifacts Office

Head: Arthur Weasley
Other personnel: Perkins
Extra info: Only one office where both Mr Weasley and Perkins work - the office is very cluttered with filing cabinets, folders and desks. It's roughly the size of largish broom-cupboard.

Level 3: Department of Accidents and Catastrophes

Fudge was a Junior Minister in this department (he was immediately on the scene when Pettigrew killed all those Muggled, faked his own death by framing Sirius and went into hiding), c. 1981

- Sub-departments:

>> Accidental Magical Reversal Squad
Head: unknown
Other personnel: unknown
Extra info: The squad is deployed to fix up people who have been splinched (left half of themselves behind) during Apparition and to right various other serious magical mistakes. They are often accompanied by Obliviators to wipe Muggles witnesses' memories clean.

>> Obliviator Headquarters
Head: unknown
Other personnel: Arnold Peasegood

>> Muggle-Worthy Excuse Committee
Head: unknown
Other personnel: unknown

Level 4: Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures

Head: Amos Diggory. This department monitors breeding and caring of magical creatures

- Sub-departments:

>> Beast Division
Head: unknown
Other personnel: Newt Scamander, after 1917; Bob (deals with issues of Experimental Breeding)
Incoporates:
Committee for the Disposal of Dangerous Creatures:
Personnel: Walden Macnair (executioner), another old wizard whose name is unknown.
Dragon Research and Restraint Bureau:
Personnel: Newt Scamander (before 1915)
Werewolf Registry:
Werewolf Capture Unit (members unknown)

For more info on what creatures are classified as 'beasts', see the Magical Creatures page.

>> Being Division
Head: unknown
Other personnel: Newt Scamander, after 1917
Incoporates:
Office of House-Elf Relocation:
Personnel: Newt Scamander, (c.1915-17)
Centaur Liaison Office:
Personnel: unknown
Goblin Liaison Office:
Personnel: Cuthbert Mockridge

>> Spirit Division
Head: unknown
Other personnel: unknown
Extra info: Formed when Ghosts argued that they weren't Beings, they were clearly "Has-Beens" and deserved special treatment.

>> Pest Advisory Bureau
Head: unknown
Other personnel: unknown
Extra info: Deal with particularly bad cases of wizarding pests such as out of control Cornish Pixies, Doxies and Garden Gnomes

Level 5: Department of International Magical Co-operation

Head: Unknown (past: Barty Crouch Sr., c. 1981-1995)
Other personnel: unknown (past: Percy Weasley - Personal assistant to Mr Crouch - c. 1994-1995)

- Sub-departments:

>> International Magical Trading Standards Body
Head: unknown
Other personnel: unknown (past: Percy Weasley, c. 1994-1995)
Extra info: Standardise things like cauldron thickness, close down on black market trading in illegal goods.

>> International Magical Office of Law
Head: unknown
Other personnel: unknown

>> International Confederation of Wizards: British Seats
Head: unknown
Other personnel: Albus Dumbledore (Supreme Mugwump)
Extra info: The equivalent of the Muggle United Nations.

Level 6: Department of Magical Transportation

>> Floo Network Authority
Head: unknown
Other personnel: unknown
Incorporates:
Floo Regulation Panel:
Personnel: Madame Edgecome
Extra info: Regulates which fireplaces are connected to the Floo Network

>> Portkey Office
Head: unknown
Other personnel: unknown
Incorporates:
Portkey Regulation Panel:
Personnel: Basil
Extra info: Sets up safe Portkeys at specific destinations, regulates the number of people using Portkeys and tries to prevent illegal/unauthorised Portkeys.

>> Broom Regulatory Control
Head: unknown
Other personnel: unknown
Extra info: Monitors broomstick travelling

>> Apparation Test Centre
Head: unknown
Other personnel: unknown
Extra info: Controls, and regulates apparation. Authorises apparation tests

Level 7: Department of Magical Games and Sports

Head: unknown (past: Ludo Bagman, untill 1996)
Other personnel: unknown (past: Bertha Jorkins untill her death in 1995)
Extra info: The Department was founded in 1750. The Magical Games and Sports corridor is untidy, with lopsided posters of Quidditch teams tacked up all along the walls.

- Sub-departments:

>> British and Irish Quidditch League Headquarters
Head: unknown
Other personnel: unknown

>> Official Gobstones Club
Head: unknown
Other personnel: unknown

>> Ludicrous Patents Office
Head: unknown
Other personnel: unknown

Level 8: The Atrium
Personnel: Eric the watchwizard (at Security)

Level 9: Department of Mysteries

Head: unknown
Other personnel: Broderick Bode (untill his death in 1996) and Croaker (Unspeakables);
Augustus Rookwood - previous member who spied for Voldemort (c. 1980)
Extra info: In the Department of Mysteries corridor, the walls are bare, there are no windows or doors except for a plain black one at the very end of the corridor. Through the black door is a rotating circular room, lined with identical black doors and tall blue candles. Each door leads to a different room in the Department of Mysteries. The Department of Mysteries studies issues that are mysterious and unexplained, even to wizardkind. The Department of Mysteries is a very dangerous and deadly place - most witches and wizards are never alowed to set foot in it, and those who work there (Unspeakables) are sworn to secrecy.

- 'Mysteries' studied:

>> Memory: The Brain Room
The Brain Room contains a large glass tank filled with brain. Evidently, wizards who work here are studying thoughts and memories - when Ron touches one of the brains, he is severly injured because the thoughts leave a deep mark on him.

>> Time: The Time Room
Time-turners and other time-contraptions and potions are kept in this room.

>> Death: The Death Chamber
The Death Chamber is to most Harry Potter fans, probably the most terrible and dangerous of all destinations in the Harry Potter books. It is a chamber that contains something that is so unexplained, so sudden and therefore so frightening ... a passageway to death itself. It is the chamber where death is studied. The Death Chamber is a large, recangular room with stone benches set upon each tier, descending to steep steps like an amphitheatre. In the centre of the pit of the chamber is a raised stone dais upon which stands an ancient, crumbling stone archway. A single, tattered black veil or curtain hangs from the archway, fluttering as if in a light breeze. From the back, the veil looks the same, just the back of a black curtain. Whispers echoe from the veil, one gets the feeling that there are people standing behind it. Only Harry and Luna hear the whispers - as only they see the Thestrals because they have seen people die. Harry and Luna can sense the dead behind the veil. When the Death Eaters battle the Order, Sirius falls through the veil while duelling with Bellatrix. He doesn't come out the other side - he's dead. Harry tries to follow but Lupin restrains him. This leads us to believe that the veil is a passageway between the living and dead.

For more info on this, see Phoenix Fever.

>> Love
The power of love, it's effects and the magic spells it casts (such as Harry's mom's love did on him) are studied here.

>> Prophecies: Hall of Prophecies
The Hall of Prophecies is high as a church and full of nothing but long, towering shelves containing small, glass orbs. This is the archive of prophecies - it contains every prophecy ever told by a seer. The prophecies are monitered by Unspeakables and from here they can sift or eliminate ones that have already come to pass or turn out to be false - and therefore try to discover their future. Each galss ball is engraved with the names of the people to whom the prophecy refers; the seer who foretold it and the witness who heard it. For example, Trelawney's prophecy about Harry and Voldemort, which Dumbledore heard is engraved:

S.P.T to A.P.W.B.D
Dark Lord and (?)Harry Potter

>> The Universe
The Mysteries of the universe are studied in a dark room full of floating planets - anyone in the room floats too.

Level 10 (bottom floor): Courtroom 10

Level 10 can be reached by going down a flight of steps leading from the Department of Mysteries corridor. It houses Courtroom 10: the dungeon-like chamber where the Death Eaters were tried for their crimes. Harry was subjected to being interrogated by the full Wizengamot in Courtroom 10 simply for an issue of Underage Magic - this was Fudge's way of humiliating and daunting Harry. Courtroom 10 is a huge, stone chamber. Rows of benches rise up above the floor where the judges sit and a single chair stands in the centre of the room, bound by chains. Below is a picture of Harry in Courtroom 10.