Norberta
From UnknowableWiki
| Creature profile | |
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| Norberta | |
| Species | dragon |
| Breed | Norwegian Ridgeback |
| Owner | Hagrid, currently being trained and looked after by Charlie Weasley |
| Appearance | Black skin, orange eyes, large wings, long snout. |
| First appearance in canon | Norbert the Norwegian Ridgeback (PS) |
Norberta, known as "Norbert" until Charlie Weasley revealed that she was female, was Rubeus Hagrid's pet dragon. She is now at the Romanian Dragon Sanctuary where Charlie works. She is a Norwegian Ridgeback, a rare breed.
Hagrid acquired the dragon egg for winning a card game against a stranger (who was actually Quirinus Quirrell in disguise, trying to find out how to get past Fluffy (PS16, PS17)) at the Hog's Head in Hogsmeade. He secretly kept the egg in his fireplace, right the middle of the fire. He only showed it to the Trio.
Ron, Harry and Hermione were also present when Norberta hatched. The baby dragon looked "like a crumpled black umbrella" with large spiny wings, a skinny body and a long snout with wide nostrils, horn stubs and bulging, orange eyes (PS14). Hagrid immediately adored her, although she tried to bite him. Unfortunately, Draco Malfoy had also seen Norberta's birth through the window of Hagrid's hut.
Norberta grew three times in length in a week. Every half hour, Hagrid had to feed her with a mixture of brandy and chicken blood. He was not able to do his gamekeeper duties anymore. After a week, the Trio convinced Hagrid to send an owl to Charlie Weasley, who was studying dragons in Romania.
By the second week, Norberta's diet changed to huge quantities of dead rats. Ron was bitten one Wednesday night when he helped with the feeding. Charlie's answer arrived on that same night: he told the Trio to bring Norberta to the Astronomy Tower at midnight on Saturday. Ron's wound got badly infected and he had to see Madam Pomfrey. Malfoy visited him in the hospital wing under the pretense that he wanted to borrow a schoolbook to have a laugh at him and threatened to tell the nurse about Norberta. By mischance, Charlie's letter was inside the book Malfoy borrowed. Nevertheless, the Trio decided to stick to the original plan.
Hagrid did not let the Harry and Hermione enter his hut when they came to tell him of Charlie's plan, because Norberta was "in a tricky stage" (PS14). The dragon could be heard thrashing and banging her tail against the walls. Hagrid cried when he heard the news, but that might also have been because Norberta bit him at that moment. Fang had also been wounded.
On Saturday evening, Hagrid had put Norberta into a big crate. He had supplied her with brandy, rats and a teddy bear, which Norberta ripped apart immediately. Harry and Hermione carried the crate to the Astronomy Tower under Harry's Invisibility Cloak. On the way, they saw McGonagall catching Draco, who tried to tell her that Harry Potter was coming with a dragon. She did not believe him.
The pair reached the tower without further delay and Charlie's friends picked up Norberta at midnight (PS14). Harry and Hermione, however, were caught by Filch on the way back and lost 50 points each (PS15).
Hagrid later revealed that losing Norberta is one of the things he thinks about when he sees Dementors, meaning that this was an incredibly traumatizing incident for him (PA12).
On Harry's seventeenth birthday, Charlie visited the Burrow and revealed that "Norbert" is, in fact, a female; they are the most vicious. Since finding out, he and the other dragon-keepers have taken to calling her Norberta (DH7).
