Literary Lineage

The lineage of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone

33 works across 28 centuries, back to Iliad and Odyssey.

  1. 19 BCE

    Aeneid

    Virgil

    Augustan Rome. Augustan Rome. written in Latin.

    Epic of the Trojan Aeneas's wanderings and his war in Italy, written as Rome's founding poem.

    What it handed down

    To The Faerie Queene (1590 (Books I-III))

    Structural model, probable.

    Spenser shaped his career on Virgil's, moving from pastoral in The Shepheardes Calender to national epic. He presented The Faerie Queene as a Virgilian poem that glorifies a dynasty through its legendary origins.

    To Orlando Furioso (1516)

    Structural model, well documented.

    Ariosto ends his poem with Ruggiero killing Rodomonte in single combat, modelled on the close of the Aeneid where Aeneas kills Turnus. Virgilian similes and the founding of the Este dynasty through Ruggiero follow Virgil's dynastic design.

    Where it came from

    Find “Aeneid” on Amazon

Share this lineage

Preview card: the tree of influence behind Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone