Crookshanks, Did he belong to the Potters? Options

[Knight]

Could Crookshanks have belonged to James and Lily?
A cat is mentioned in Lily's letter to Sirius in Book 7.
Plus, in Book 3, when Hermione bought Crookshanks, the shopkeeper told her that the cat had been there a long time and no one wanted him.
It's also interesting that Crookshanks was always after Scabbers/Peter Pettigrew, even pouncing on the rat during their first encounter in the Magical Menagerie. That was well before Crookshanks started communicating and helping Sirius Black, as revealed in Chapter 19 of Prisoner of Azkaban.
Anyway, there's no real conclusive proof, but it's just a thought...

[Dijares]

This has been moved to the chapter/chapter discussion since it is a spoiler from the book.

Please do not post spoilers anywhere but in the chapter/chapter discussion.

As for the Potter cat being Crookshanks, suppose it's possible. Good question for JKR.

[Mione Weasley]

I wonder now too. I forgot about a cat in the 7th book. It's possible that that's why Crookshanks had it in for Scabbers. Plus Crookshanks isn't all cat, he's half Kneazle(sp?) (read Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them if you've never heard of a Kneazle.)

This post has been edited by Mione Weasley: Aug 9 2007, 12:24 PM

[Perseus_Evans]

I'm going to have to say two things...

Great theory overall! It would be very cool if Crookshanks were the Potters cat.

But... The problem is that Sirius most certainly would have recognized the cat, having been best friends with James. In PoA, he speaks about how Crookshanks is very intelligent, and all. But he never talks about knowing the cat previously. You'd think that would have been a fantastic plot point, that the reason Crookshanks had helped Sirius to get passwords and such was because they had been friends at the Potters... Instead it was just that Sirius had gained his trust. Since when does JKR miss an opportunity for a plot twist like that?

I'm going to have to say it's pretty unlikely...

Still a cool theory, all the same.

[baty4potter]

I agree with you Perseus, good theory, but I don't think it would be the Potters either, for just the reason you explained.

I would like to know more about Crookshanks, how Hermione came across him, and where he actually came from. I wonder if he wasn't one of Mrs Figgs cat kneazles?

[Witherwings]

In favor of the idea:

We can assume the cat might have been young when the Potters got it and by all intents and purposes, could have found its way to the store as Crookshanks. And the fact that the cat does attack Wormtail before even meeting Sirius does suggest that there is that possibility. Now, if the cat, like everyone, thought that Sirius is the one who betrayed the Potters and learned to trust Sirius over time, that then contradicts the idea that he was chasing Wormtail in the beginning of the book because Wormtail betrayed the Potters. We can assume there might have been numerous occassions upon which the cat saw the rat, perhaps one of them being the night the Potters died. Now perhaps the cat never saw Sirius as an animagus and didn't trust him because he was a dog. And Sirius might a) never have seen the cat, (IMG:style_emoticons/default/cool.gif) never thought it the same cat, and c) forgot all about the cat after all the horrors he endured.

However, against this:

Would Crookshanks not have gone to Harry instead of Hermione? Sure, Hermione buys him, but if he reallys belongs to Harry, wouldn't the cat automatically belong to Harry like other magical items his parents had? Also, if Crookshanks belonged to the Potters why isn't he overly friendly with Harry? And then Perseus' and Baty's arguments here are also valid about the cat not recognizing Sirius or Sirius not recognizing the cat.

Also, I'm amazed by the cat's name - Crook and Shanks. It's not a name one can really trust, is it? Perhaps it was Mundungus's cat.

This post has been edited by Witherwings: Aug 13 2007, 12:18 AM

[hugamuggle]

Ok, so this isn't really adding anything at all to the theory (GREAT theory by the way!), but i just wanted to say one thing. Witherwings mentions the cat having to belong to harry if it belonged to his parents, but i don't find this to be a reasonable idea. The only living creatures that are honorbound to pass on to it's owner's next of kin are house elves. All other creatures, magical or not, are free to leave at any time, and i'd find that cats being the snarkiest of all creatures on earth would probably not even need the death of the owner to turn tail and hit the road if you know what i mean. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/laugh.gif) cats pretty much do whatever the heck they want! If all animals in HP were bound to their owners, you wouldn't see Neville's toad making a dash for freedom every five minutes hehe! I think Dumbledore's pheonix proved it well enough that the living things of the HP universe are not honorbound to their owners, but stay with them out of loyalty.

That being said, if Crookshanks was the Potter's cat, he'd have been unable to rejoin Harry even if he wanted to, as he'd have been taken away as soon as the disaster was over, and crookshanks left to wait inside of a pet shop far away for what? 12 years? Could be the reason why nobody wanted the cat, too. Touched by curse and all that perhaps?? It does raise the question though... Harry muses to himself at some point that there had been a cat, and he wonders what happened to it. Maybe Sirius and the cat weren't aquainted in animagus form those 12 or 13 years before, so the cat wouldn't recognize Sirius as a dog? And that's a long time for a cat to waste away in a shop, so it would be reasonable if he didn't have a huge memory of it's brief life in a home as well.

Ok, now i'm rambling (IMG:style_emoticons/default/tongue.gif) it's just a cool theory though!