Muggle

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See also: muggle

English

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Number 4, Privet Drive; where Harry Potter is raised by Muggles: Vernon Dursley and his wife Petunia (Harry's mother's sister); who have a son named Dudley, also a Muggle.[1]

Etymology

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From mug (“contemptible or stupid person; gullible or easily cheated person”) +‎ -le (diminutive suffix), coined by British author J. K. Rowling in her 1997 book Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone.[2][3]

Pronunciation

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Noun

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Muggle (plural Muggles)

  1. A person who has no magical abilities.
    • 2005, Christine Wicker, Not in Kansas Anymore: A Curious Tale of How Magic is Transforming America, New York, N.Y.: HarperSanFrancisco, →ISBN, page 194:
      The magical and the muggle are separated by a river, wide and deep. I could see across, but I couldn't get across, [...].
    • 2005 April 1, “Kirkus Reviews, review of Charlotte Haptie, Otto and the Bird Charmers”, in Dow Jones:
      Once again, THE magic-working Karmidee, marginalized by THE Muggle-ish Normals, are threatened by a coup in THE city's government [...]
    • 2005 August 19, Felix Cheong, “Age-old sexism still pervades films about witches and wizards”, in Channel NewsAsia:
      In her second outing as a witch — the first being Practical Magic (1998) — Nicole Kidman plays Isabel, a witch who's trying to settle down to the Muggle life of a suburban housewife.
    • 2005 September 30, Jeffrey Weiss, “Review of Christine Wicker, Not in Kansas Anymore”, in The Dallas Morning News:
      It could all be deadly earnest if she didn't have a sense of humor. My favorite sentence is a chapter title: "Every time you hear a bell, a Muggle has turned magical."
    • 2007 November 11, Lesley Oldfield, “Family break a eureka moment”, in Sunday Sun, Newcastle upon Tyne: Reach plc, →ISSN, →OCLC:
      As it was nearing Halloween, we were able to join a potions class where we could change liquids into myriad colours with the addition of substances like dragon spit (muggle’s lemon juice).
    • 2007 November 21, Gary Thompson, “Dylan divided by six”, in The Philadelphia Inquirer‎[1], Philadelphia, Pa.: The Philadelphia Inquirer, LLC, →ISSN, →OCLC:
      There's another guy playing [Bob] Dylan as a formal poet facing some kind of muggle inquisition, but this is the movie's briefest and least consequential thread.
  2. (by extension) A person who lacks a particular ability or skill; a non-specialist; also, a person who is not a member of a group; an outsider or cowan.
    Synonyms: see Thesaurus:mainstreamer
    This video game won’t appeal to muggles.
    • 2003 May 14, “There are too many flashing lights nowadays for a knight of the road …”, in Nursing Standard:
      [...] I have finally worked out that the word ECNALUBMA in back-to-front writing translates as 'get out of my way, you Muggle motorist'.
    • 2005, David Harvie, Ben Trott, Keir Milburn, editors, Shut Them Down!: The G8, Gleneagles 2005 and the Movement of Movements, Leeds, West Yorkshire: Dissent!; Brooklyn, New York, N.Y.: Autonomedia, →ISBN, page 343:
      Some activists might know little of this ‘exterior’, such is their facility to move between activist spaces and places without having to encounter the ever-increasingly one-dimensional world in which the ‘muggles’ live.
    • 2021 October 31, Ace Admiral [username], “Why is no one talking about the tip of the spear?: An[sic] reading of the asexual academy through Skopos Theory”, in A Hand-Painted China Plate at a Barbeque‎[2], WordPress, retrieved 2021-11-02:
      But to me, remembering what it was like to be a beginner is also an exercise in humility. I see a lot of people wanting to push ahead, faster, in all directions, and I find this to be… woefully out of step with even the Muggles who know me, […]
    1. (geocaching, specifically) A person not involved in the pastime of geocaching.
      • 2004, Joel McNamara, Geocaching for Dummies (For Dummies), Hoboken, N.J.: Wiley, →ISBN, page 125:
        At some point when you're out geocaching, you'll run into Muggles. The trouble with Muggles is they have no idea what the sport of geocaching is all about. If they see you find a cache, they might get into the cache after you leave—to see what you were up to.
      • 2006, Wisconsin Natural Resources, Madison, Wis.: Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 89:
        Try not to let the muggles see you find a Cache.
      • 2010, Paul Gillin, Dana Gillin, “Appendix A: Glossary”, in The Joy of Geocaching […], Fresno, Calif.: Quill Driver Books, →ISBN, page 235:
        Use Stealth. Commonly used in a place with a high muggle-to-geocacher ratio.
      • 2016 February 16, Selina Powell, “The hidden world of geocaching in Marlborough”, in Marlborough Express (reproduced on Stuff)‎[3], Blenheim, New Zealand: Stuff, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 16 May 2020:
        Each time we made a find [Teresa] Hinton would check there were no muggles, or non-geocachers, around before taking the container from its hiding place.
      • 2018 February 6, Joseph Smith, “The ‘dead drop’ in Stokes Croft may be more than it appears”, in Bristol Post‎[4], Bristol, Somerset: Reach plc, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 10 February 2018:
        Caches can be hidden in a disguised container, or very small package, and one element of difficulty is hiding caches in urban locations, where the hunter will have to avoid being spotted by ‘muggles’ – the name given to those unaware of the sport. Muggles will be surprised at the scale of the secret game taking place under their noses.

Usage notes

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In the Fantastic Beasts film series, it is revealed that in American usage, the term "no-maj" is typically used instead of "muggle".

Alternative forms

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Translations

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References

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  1. ^ The offspring of two Muggles is not necessarily a Muggle; for example, Hermione Granger's parents are both Muggles, but Hermione herself is a wizard.
  2. ^ For example, J. K. Rowling (1997 June 26) Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, London: Bloomsbury Publishing, →ISBN, page 4: “'A Muggle,' said Hagrid. 'It's what we call non-magic folk like them. An' it's your bad luck you grew up in a family o' the biggest Muggles I ever laid eyes on.'”
  3. ^ “Muggle, n.4”, in OED Online Paid subscription required⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, March 2003; “muggle, n.”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.

Further reading

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