Avada Kedavra

• Incantation: Avada Kedavra
• Pronunciation: uh-VAH-dah kuh-DAH-vruh
• Wand Movement: Not mentioned in the novels.
• Light: A blindingly intense jet or flash of green light.
• Effect: Causes instantaneous and painless death. The curse leaves no physical mark or sign of injury on the victim's body.
• Type: Curse, Dark Magic, Unforgivable Curses.

The Avada Kedavra curse, also known as the Killing Curse, is one of the three Unforgivable Curses. Its use on a human being is punishable by a life sentence in Azkaban. It is the signature spell of Lord Voldemort and was used extensively by his Death Eaters during both the First Wizarding War and the Second Wizarding War. Key instances of its use include:

• c. 1943: Tom Riddle uses the curse to murder his father and grandparents, the Riddles, in Little Hangleton. He frames his uncle, Morfin Gaunt, for the crime.
• October 31, 1981: Lord Voldemort murders James Potter and Lily Potter in Godric's Hollow. When he turns his wand on the infant Harry Potter, the curse rebounds due to Lily Potter's sacrificial protection, destroying Voldemort's body and leaving Harry with only a lightning-bolt scar.
• August 1994: Lord Voldemort, in his rudimentary body, uses Peter Pettigrew's wand to murder the Muggle caretaker Frank Bryce.
• 1994-1995 School Year: Bartemius Crouch Jr., disguised as Alastor Moody, demonstrates the curse on a spider during a Defence Against the Dark Arts lesson at Hogwarts.
• May 1995: Bartemius Crouch Jr. murders his father, Bartemius Crouch Sr., using the curse.
• June 24, 1995: At the command of Lord Voldemort, Peter Pettigrew uses Voldemort's wand to murder Cedric Diggory in the Little Hangleton graveyard.
• July 1996: Severus Snape kills Albus Dumbledore with the Killing Curse atop the Astronomy Tower, fulfilling a pre-arranged pact between them.
• July 1997: Lord Voldemort murders Charity Burbage, the Muggle Studies professor, at a Death Eater meeting in Malfoy Manor.
• July 27, 1997: During the Battle of the Seven Potters, Lord Voldemort murders Alastor Moody.
• March 1998: Lord Voldemort kills the wizard Gellert Grindelwald in his cell at Nurmengard prison.
• May 2, 1998: During the Battle of Hogwarts, the curse is used frequently by Death Eaters.
  1. Vincent Crabbe attempts to cast it at Hermione Granger but is stopped by Ron Weasley.
  2. Lord Voldemort uses it to murder Harry Potter in the Forbidden Forest. However, the curse only destroys the fragment of Voldemort's soul (the Horcrux) that resided within Harry.
  3. In the final duel, Lord Voldemort's Avada Kedavra rebounds off Harry Potter's Expelliarmus because the Elder Wand would not kill its true master. The rebounded curse strikes and kills Lord Voldemort.

Learning to cast Avada Kedavra successfully requires immense magical power and a genuine, deep-seated desire to commit murder. As Bartemius Crouch Jr. (as Moody) explained to his fourth-year class, a novice caster would likely fail to produce more than a flash of light, causing little to no harm. The Killing Curse is infamous for being unblockable; it cannot be stopped by standard shielding charms like Protego. However, there are a few known ways to survive it:

• Physical Obstruction: The curse can be blocked by solid physical objects. Albus Dumbledore frequently animated statues and other objects to intercept the curse during his duel with Lord Voldemort in the Ministry of Magic.
• Sacrificial Protection: The most powerful counter is a specific act of love-based, sacrificial magic. When a person willingly chooses to die to save another, the intended victim is imbued with a lingering protection that can repel even the Killing Curse. This is the ancient magic that saved Harry Potter as a baby.
• Priori Incantatem: When two “brother” wands (wands sharing a core from the same creature) are forced to duel, one wand can force the other to regurgitate the spells it has previously cast. This occurred during the duel between Harry and Voldemort in the Little Hangleton graveyard.
• Wand Allegiance: A wand will not work properly against its true master. The Elder Wand's allegiance to Harry Potter was the ultimate reason for Lord Voldemort's defeat, as it refused to murder Harry and rebounded the curse instead.
• Horcruxes: While not a defense against the curse's effect, a Horcrux can anchor a soul to the mortal plane, allowing the caster to survive even if their body is destroyed by a Killing Curse.

J.K. Rowling stated that the incantation derives from an Aramaic phrase, “Abhadda Kedhabhra,” which she translated as “let the thing be destroyed.” She intended it as an inversion of “Abracadabra,” which in ancient times was a charm used to ward off illness and promote healing. Rowling took this word for protection and twisted it into a spell that causes ultimate harm.

• In a 2004 interview at the Edinburgh Book Festival, J.K. Rowling confirmed the Aramaic origin of the incantation and her intention to have it mean “let the thing be destroyed,” referring to the person in front of the caster (J.K. Rowling interview).
• In the film adaptations, the curse is consistently portrayed as a jet of intense green light, often accompanied by a distinctive, screeching sound.
• In the film version of *Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix*, Bellatrix Lestrange is explicitly shown casting Avada Kedavra to kill Sirius Black, which differs from the novel where the specific spell that hits him is not named (film).