Who is R.A.B.?

Question

I heard something about Regelus Black, but what do you all think?

Answer 1

I think that RAB is Regulus Black. We all know that he was a Death Eater, and was killed shortly after joining up. I think that before his death, he stole the locket Horcrux, tried to destroy it, but it ultimately ended up at his childhood home at Number 12, Grimmauld Place. There is evidence of this on page 116 of the American Edition of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. "A heavy locket that none of them could open" is mentioned. Now that Harry owns Grimmauld Place, I think that he, Ron, and Hermione will just have to go there and discover it. What JKR had to say about RAB in an interview with Melissa Anelli and Emerson Spartz:

MA: R.A.B.

JKR: Ohhh, good.

[All laugh.]

JKR: No, I'm glad! Yes?

MA: Can we figure out who he is, from what we know so far?

[Note: JKR has adopted slightly evil look here]

JKR: Do you have a theory?

MA: We've come up with Regulus Black.

JKR: Have you now?

MA: Uh-oh.

[Laughter.]

JKR: Well, I think that would be, um, a fine guess.

MA: And perhaps, being Sirius’s brother, he had another mirror –

JKR: [drums fingers on soda can]

MA: Does he have the other mirror, or Sirius’s mirror —

JKR: I have no comment at all on that mirror. That mirror is not on the table. [Laughter from all; Jo's is maniacal.]

However, if I had to come up with another guess, I would have to say Amelia Bones. She was the aunt of Susan Bones, and was killed in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. However, I think this is unlikely because the Horcrux seems to have been replaced awhile ago.

If you want a link where you can read the most about R.A.B., go here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R.A.B.

To the Dark Lord
I know I will be dead long before you read this
but I want you to know that it was I who discovered your secret.
I have stolen the real Horcrux and intend to destroy it as soon as I can.
I face death in the hope that when you meet your match
you will be mortal once more.
R.A.B.

Also a note to THE FANTASY PRINCESS: Awesome answer, but remember that it's not cool to copy and paste if you don't add a direct link to your sources. Cheers!

Answer 2

No one knows really. I think Regelus Black is a bit too obvious, given J.K. Rowling's past plot twists...especially with all the family's in the series whose surnames begin with B.

Answer 3

I think its surely someone in the black family, I mean who else in the books has a last name who starts with a B? Look at the fam tree online. If you want to discuss it, E-mail me! [e-mail]

Answer 4

I personally think it is Regelus Black as well. If you go read my question on Harry Potter there are many people who agree and there are theories on the book. You can answer my question if you want as well.

Answer 5

I can't think of anyone else, but I'm sure JKR is going to surprise us. Everyone on the harrypotter.com forums thinks they know everything about what's going to happen in the end, and they don't!

Answer 6

think it is regulas black. but i dont think nagini is the last horcrux. i think hogwarts is a horcrux. yes the castle. because when they attacked. people who go to school there would leave. so the no one could destroy it. but if they stayed they would put more secruity in it so no one could destroy it.

Answer 7

R.A.B.???
READ...
The initials R.A.B. are the main clue to the identity of a character revealed in the final chapters of the sixth book of J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter series, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. The character's identity is left as an unsolved mystery, apparently to be revealed in the final, seventh book.

In Chapter 28 of Half-Blood Prince, the following note was found in a locket recovered by Albus Dumbledore and Harry Potter:

To the Dark Lord
I know I will be dead long before you read this
but I want you to know that it was I who discovered your secret.
I have stolen the real Horcrux and intend to destroy it as soon as I can.
I face death in the hope that when you meet your match
you will be mortal once more.
R.A.B.

The locket was recovered in the belief that it was one of Lord Voldemort's Horcruxes. Harry, along with Hermione and Ron, start to investigate who might have had the initials R.A.B. Hermione searches the books in the school library for the names of any wizards with the initials, but only finds two: Rosalind Antigone Bungs and Rupert "Axebanger" Brookstanton. Neither Bungs nor Brookstanton seemed very likely candidates to be the writer of the note.

There are no candidates specifically mentioned in the books having exactly R.A.B. as initials, apart from those identified by Hermione. However, there are several characters with surnames beginning with "B" and with unknown given or middle names, or whose initials might match "R.A.B." if they preferred to use their middle name as if it were their given name. There could also be characters who changed their surname, as by marriage.

J. K. Rowling has stated in interviews that the sixth book of the Harry Potter series is to a large degree the first part of a two part story. She has also stated that no new major characters will be introduced in the final book. Readers have drawn the conclusion that the mysterious R.A.B. must represent a person or persons already known in the existing books and that it is possible to determine the identity of R.A.B. by careful study. A wide fan-following of the Harry Potter series began speculating almost instantaneously about the identity of R.A.B., since this would likely and markedly affect the plot of the seventh book.

Melissa Anelli from The Leaky Cauldron and Emerson Spartz from Mugglenet were invited by J. K. Rowling to interview her immediately after The Half-Blood Prince was published. [1] Emerson asked Rowling, "What's one question you wished to be asked and what would be the answer to the question?"

She replied, "Um — such a good question. What do I wish I could be asked? Today, just today, July the 16th, I was really hoping someone would ask me about R.A.B., and you did it. Just today, because I think that is — well, I hoped that people would."

Melissa asked, "Is there more we should ask about him?" Rowling replied, "There are things you will deduce on further reading, I think — well you two definitely will, for sure — that, yeah, I was really hoping that R.A.B. would come out." As is Rowling's normal policy in such interviews, this did not confirm or deny that R.A.B. had been identified.

[edit]
Regulus Black
The character who has the greatest support as a candidate to be R.A.B. is Regulus Black, the younger brother of Sirius Black, who has been mentioned in passing but has not had any plot significance yet. Previously mentioned in the interview quoted above, Anelli suggested to Rowling that R.A.B. could stand for Regulus A. Black. The following conversation ensued:


Rowling: "Well, I think that would be, um, a fine guess.".
Melissa: "Forgive me if I'm remembering incorrectly, but was Regulus the one who was murdered by Voldemort?"
Rowling: "Well Sirius said he wouldn't have been because he wasn't important enough, remember?"
Melissa: "But that doesn’t have to be true, if [R.A.B.] is writing Voldemort a personal note."
Rowling: "That doesn't necessarily show that Voldemort killed him, personally, but Sirius himself suspected that Regulus got in a little too deep. Like Draco. He was attracted to it, but the reality of what it meant was way too much to handle."


Many believe these comments to be indirect confirmation that R.A.B. is Regulus Black.

Rowling had already been asked about Regulus prior to the publication of The Half-Blood Prince, during World Book Day online chat, March 4, 2004. Rowling answering the question: "Will we be hearing anything from Sirius Black's brother, Regulus, in future books?" said: "Well, he's dead, so he's pretty quiet these days."

Regulus is mentioned three times in The Half-Blood Prince, by Albus Dumbledore, by Horace Slughorn, and then by Remus Lupin, early in the book. In comparison, his brother Sirius was mentioned by Hagrid in the opening chapter of the first book, with no further mention until The Prisoner of Azkaban, where he was the title character alongside Harry.

Regulus was a Death Eater who tried to disassociate himself from Voldemort. He was killed on Voldemort's orders (Sirius notes that Regulus was too unimportant to warrant Voldemort doing this himself). The note left by R.A.B. addresses Voldemort as The Dark Lord, and Death Eaters are one of the only groups who customarily refer to him thus.

Regulus' middle initial is unknown (it does not appear on the family tree tapestry at 12 Grimmauld Place, the Black family home and headquarters of The Order of the Phoenix). However it is possible he may have been given the middle name Alphard (after his uncle), or Arcturus (after his grandfather), as those names do appear on the Black Family Tree. The family tree was derived from a hand-drawn sketch of the tree made by J.K. Rowling herself, and from information extracted from the novels and various interviews.

The object which had replaced the real Horcrux was a locket. Dumbledore believed the real Horcrux to also be a locket, once the property of Salazar Slytherin. Chapter Six of The Order of the Phoenix mentions a heavy, unopenable locket in a glass case at number 12 Grimmauld Place. The locket was amongst property discarded by Sirius Black as he undertook a total cleaning of the house. There was no mention of it having a Slytherin seal, which the real Slytherin locket is known to have. The locket may have been taken either by the house elf Kreacher, who was trying to save Black family artifacts from the house cleaning, or stolen by Mundungus Fletcher, who was keen to exploit the financial potential of any neglected goods. Mundungus is later spotted with a suitcase full of possessions taken from the house, and in the company of the barman from the Hog's Head. J. K. Rowling confirmed the barman is Dumbledore's brother Aberforth. Aberforth was seen drawing his cloak about his throat, as if concealing something, as he walked away from the scene. It is possible that he now has the locket. Mundungus was later arrested and taken to Azkaban prison.

[edit]
Translations of R.A.B. and Black
In several foreign-language versions of the series, the surname Black has been translated into the respective language to carry the same meaning (the colour black). In those cases, the 'B' in R.A.B. has been changed accordingly. For example, the Dutch edition uses the initials R.A.Z. (as in Zwarts) in the note, the Norwegian edition has R.A.S. (as in Svaart) and the Finnish edition has the letters R.A.M. (as in Musta).

The fact that the translation of the name Regulus Black and the initials R.A.B. are consistent across various language editions gives fair support to Regulus Black that other known characters do not have. However, translation of the Harry Potter books into authorized editions in other languages are performed by translating co-authors other than J. K. Rowling, although she would undoubtedly have approval and veto authority over any crucial plot details. Nevertheless these alternate editions might not be considered absolutely canonical. The author is not fluent in many of the languages and cultures that the series is printed in, and therefore must relinquish much literary license to the translators. The translations of R.A.B. and Black themselves could conceivably have come about coincidentally, or the translators may have switched both the name and the initials based on their own assumption that R.A.B is "Regulus Black". The translating authors may have even been instructed as to what names and initials to use, as a carefully planned deception to throw readers off the "real trail" to the true identity of R.A.B. Therefore, the mere observation that the translations support the "R.A.B. is Regulus Black" theory, does not necessarily provide conclusive proof of the matter.

See List of characters in translations of Harry Potter for more information regarding name translations.

Other Theories
Regulus Black is not the only candidate for the identity of R.A.B. Several other characters in the Harry Potter series have last names starting with the letter B, and whose first or middle names are not provided.

Answer 8

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.rab.uk.com/images/homepageimage.gif&imgrefurl=http://www.rab.uk.com/&h=411&w=360&sz=64&tbnid=jOam-_K_rr51HM:&tbnh=121&tbnw=105&hl=en&start=4&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dwho%2Bis%2BR.A.B%26svnum%3D10%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26rls%3DGGLG,GGLG:2005-49,GGLG:en