Culture

The Magic That Inspired J.K. Rowling to Create Harry Potter

Making Magic

A new exhibition at the British Library in London reveals how author J.K. Rowling relied on the real history of magic and alchemy to create her wizarding world in ‘Harry Potter.’

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Nils Jorgensen/REX/Shutterstock

LONDON—A six-foot scroll preserved since the 16th century is stretched out on a table offering instructions for the creation of a “philosopher’s stone.”

These sorcerer’s stones—which alchemists claimed would turn base metals into gold and grant their holders immortality—were the inspiration for the first Harry

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