Pottermore.com, now known as WizardingWorld.com, has mysteriously removed the official Ilvermorny Sorting Quiz from its website.
The Ilvermorny Sorting Quiz let fans learn which house they belonged to at the American Wizarding School. The quiz launched in summer 2016 and was a big deal, because for decades, fans had been clamoring to learn more about the stateside school of magic.
The official quiz was part of a new “Magic in North America” series, which unveiled lots of details for the first time about Ilvermorny. It was all timed with the release of the first Fantastic Beasts film, which was primarily set in 1920’s New York City.
Pottermore had went so far as to release a special video about Ilvermorny:
Rowling quickly received backlash for her work on Ilvermorny due to allegations of cultural appropriation and copyright infringement. While the Ilvermorny quiz stayed up for years following these allegations, it’s possible that these are reasons why the quiz was ultimately taken down.
Also at play is the Pottermore relaunch: In 2019, the site rebranded as WizardingWorld.com, and all of the remaining official quizzes were moved into the Wizarding Passport. For some reason, they did not deem the Ilvermorny Sorting Test a worthwhile feature.
The disappearance of the Ilvermorny House Quiz may signal that there will be no further references to Ilvermorny in the Fantastic Beasts film series.
A source close to the website confirmed to Hypable that the Sorting Quiz “is not and has not been available for the time being on the Wizarding World website.”
About Ilvermorny
In the video above, we learn that Ilvermorny School of Witchcraft and Wizardry was founded by a young Irish girl named Isolt Sayre, with a unique stolen wand.
On their website, J.K. Rowling revealed that the American school was founded in the seventeenth century, and that it’s located on top of Mount Greylock in Massachusetts.
As a young girl, Isolt was kidnapped by her aunt Gormlaith Gaunt (yes, that Gaunt!), a “fanatical pure-blood” who was revealed to have killed Isolt’s parents.
Isolt, a descendant of Salazar Slytherin, wasn’t allowed to go to Hogwarts. Once an adult, Isolt disguised herself as a man and escaped to America. From there, the tale really begins to take shape; we learn about how she came up with the four house symbols (particularly the Horned Serpent), and how she eventually fell in love.
The tale also reveals how new students are sorted! Rowling explains how they’re taken to the entrance hall and one-by-one called to stand by the ‘Gordian Knot,’ to wait for one of the four house symbols to claim them.
“If the Horned Serpent wants the student, the crystal set into its forehead will light up. If the Wampus wants the student, it roars. The Thunderbird signifies its approval by beating its wings, and the Pukwudgie will raise its arrow into the air,” Rowling writes.
Further, we learn more about what the four Houses represent: “It is sometimes said of the Ilvermorny houses that they represent the whole witch or wizard: the mind is represented by Horned Serpent; the body, Wampus; the heart, Pukwudgie and the soul, Thunderbird. Others say that Horned Serpent favours scholars, Wampus, warriors, Pukwudgie, healers and Thunderbird, adventurers.”
While it’s not totally the same as Hogwarts, we can definitely see the similarities (Horned Serpent = Ravenclaw, Wampus = Gryffindor, Pukwudgie = Hufflepuff and Thunderbird = Slytherin), though the correlation isn’t absolute. It makes sense for them to be so similar though, considering that Isolt grew up hearing stories about Hogwarts, and always wished to go there herself.
Additional reporting by Selina Wilken