Snape’s Hidden Message
Last Updated: 1/10/2017
This easter egg is found in the first Harry Potter movie, "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone".
When Harry first meets Professor Snape, who at the time taught the Potions class, Snape asks Harry, “Tell me, what would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?”
If we break down this question Victorian Flower Language states that asphodel is a type of lily which means, ‘My regrets follow you to the grave’ and Wormwood means, ‘absence’, and also symbolized bitter sorrow.
So if we put these alternate meanings together Snape is really secretly telling Harry, “I bitterly regret Lily’s death.”, Lily being Harry’s mother. The reason for this hidden meaning becomes clear in later installment of the movies as we learn Snape was in love with Lily, but his actions indirectly caused her death at the hands of Lord Voldemort.
