Dorset

• Type: County
• Location: South West England
• Owner/Residents: Primarily Muggles
• Key Features: A real-world Muggle-inhabited county on the English Channel coast, containing the wizarding-related village of Budleigh Babberton.

Dorset is a county in South West England, located on the coast of the English Channel. In the wizarding world, it is known to be a predominantly Muggle area, making it an unremarkable and therefore effective hiding place for a wizard wishing to avoid detection. Its landscape consists of rolling hills and a famous coastline, providing a quiet, rural setting far from major wizarding centres. The primary wizarding significance of Dorset stems from it being the location of Budleigh Babberton, the village where Horace Slughorn sought refuge before the start of Harry Potter's sixth year at Hogwarts.

Dorset serves as the setting for a crucial early chapter in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. Albus Dumbledore brings Harry Potter to the Dorset village of Budleigh Babberton with the mission of persuading Horace Slughorn to return to his teaching post at Hogwarts. Slughorn, fearing recruitment or attack by Voldemort and his Death Eaters, was hiding in a house belonging to a Muggle family on holiday. To throw off potential pursuers, he had ransacked the living room to mimic the signs of a struggle and magically disguised himself as an armchair. Dumbledore immediately saw through the crude deception, restored the room to its proper state, and, with Harry's help as an enticement, successfully convinced Slughorn to accept the Potions master position. This event, which takes place in Dorset, is the catalyst for uncovering the secret of Voldemort's Horcruxes, as Slughorn possesses the critical, unaltered memory that Dumbledore needs to confirm his theory.

• Budleigh Babberton: A small, quiet Muggle village. It was here that Horace Slughorn hid in a borrowed Muggle house during the summer of 1996.

The name of the fictional village, Budleigh Babberton, is likely a playful homage to the real town of Budleigh Salterton, which is located in the neighboring county of Devon, very close to the Dorset border. This use of a similar-sounding, slightly altered place name is a common feature in J.K. Rowling's world-building.