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Harry Potter: Man from Wales has created map of 5000 fictional locations

HogwartsImage source, Getty Images
Image caption,

Ever wanted to go to Hogwarts? This map could help you!

While muggles aren't usually allowed to know the secret location of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, one man in Wales has done some detective work and thinks he's worked out where to find it!

Rhys B Davies has spent the last two years creating a world map of 5,000 fictional film, TV, book and gaming locations.

Some he said were fairly easy, but others, like Harry Potter's magical school Hogwarts, were a little bit more tricky.

Where on Earth is Hogwarts?

While Hogwarts School is generally accepted to be located somewhere in Scotland, Harry Potter author JK Rowling has never specifically said where.

So Rhys set out to crack the clues scattered across all the different Harry Potter books, movies and plays.

"You got to look for evidence," said Rhys, who lives in the very real Welsh seaside town of Aberystwyth.

He said the Harry Potter film series puts Hogwarts in the West Highlands, but "the books tell a different story".

He continued: "We've got a rough idea of when Hogwarts got its railway connection, which meant we were able to look at railway maps and see what lines were open by that period.

Image source, Getty Images
Image caption,

Harry Potter's Hogwarts Express steams along track located in the west of Scotland

"We know that it's near Dufftown [Moray, Scotland] because Sirius Black passes through there on his way to Hogwarts from London.

"And crucially, in the Harry Potter and the Cursed Child stage play, Harry's son is able to walk from Hogwarts to Aviemore in less than a night.

"So the result seems to be that Hogwarts is within walking distance of Aviemore. So it's not in the West Highlands. It's in the Grampians."

Why did he decide to make this map?

Basically, for fun!

He joined up with his friend Matt to create a map of fake Britain years ago and he said "that went down a treat".

Image source, Rhys B Davies
Image caption,

This is Rhys, who put the map together with his friend Matt

They then went on to map out an in-depth look at the streets of London.

"After both of those worked out so well, we thought let's get ambitious, let's try and do the whole planet," Rhys said.