《HP官方资料翻译集（物品篇）》霁随心

59、活点地图

　　【Pottermore中关于活点地图（Marauder's Map）的内容】
　　（翻译来自哈原吧《★Pottermore罗琳背景素材专贴★》第63楼）

　　大概没有哪个学生（甚至包括哈利·波特、罗恩·韦斯莱、赫敏·格兰杰和汤姆·里德尔在内）能像詹姆·破特、小天狼星·布莱克、莱姆斯·卢平和小矮星彼得这四位活点地图的创造者和参与者们那样，如此彻底而不正当地探索过霍格沃茨学校的城堡和场地了。
　　最初促使詹姆、小天狼星和彼得在深夜去学校场院探险的原因并非仅仅是出于恶作剧心理(尽管这也算是原因之一)，而是出于帮助他们最亲密的朋友莱姆斯·卢平能承受住变形成狼人这一艰难时期的强烈愿望。早在狼毒药剂被发明之前，卢平每月都要被迫忍受一次变形的折磨。而他三个好朋友刚一发现这一情况，他们就想出了一种得以减轻他变形时的孤独感和痛苦感的方法，即他们学会了（未注册的）阿尼玛格斯，这样他们陪伴他时就不会受到伤害。小天狼星、小矮星彼得、詹姆可分别变成一条狗、一只老鼠和一头牡鹿的能力使他们能在夜晚去城堡场院内探险而不被抓到。同时，城堡内部构造在詹姆隐形衣的帮助下也随着时间推移而逐渐绘制出来。
　　活点地图长期以来证明了包括哈利父亲、教父和最喜爱的老师在内的四个好友所具有的高超的魔法技能。他们在霍格沃茨期间创作出的这幅地图表面看只是一张空白羊皮纸，只有当说出“我庄严发誓我不坏好意”时才能激活使用羊皮纸，这句话至少在四位创造者中的三人看来，就是一句玩笑。他们写的“不怀好意”绝非指加入黑魔法阵营，而是指违反学校纪律；类似的大胆行为也通过他们在地图上使用自己的绰号（“月亮脸、虫尾巴、大脚板、尖头叉子”）而得以体现。
　　在创作地图时用到的魔法非常高超，且令人印象深刻；上面含有“微型模拟”咒，可使地图拥有者跟踪城堡内每个人的动态，地图还被施了魔法，以永远（尽其所能地侮辱性）抵制它的劲敌，西弗勒斯·斯内普的好奇和窥探。
　　虽然在哈利波特系列小说中并未交代创作者们如何丢失地图的具体细节，但也能看出他们因过于自大而最终被阿格斯·费尔奇抓住，他很有可能是得到了斯内普的告密，后者长期以来执着于揭发其夙敌詹姆·波特的不当行径。这幅地图杰作在小天狼星、詹姆、莱姆斯和彼得在霍格沃茨的最后一年被没收，他们后来谁都没能从性格多疑、准备周全的费尔奇手中再把它偷回来。无论怎样，他们首要考虑的事还是在学年最后几个月内发生了变化，转而更为严肃地对待霍格沃茨之外，那个伏地魔正日渐强大的世界。地图的四位创作者不久后都加入了由阿不思·邓布利多领导的叛离性组织凤凰社。而他们昔日母校的地图——无论多有独创性——对他们而言除了可用于怀旧以外都毫无用处了。
　　不过，活点地图在年轻的韦斯莱双胞胎的手上有着极大的用处。关于弗雷德和乔治如何获得地图一事在《阿兹卡班囚徒》一书中有所交待。他们出于对哈利·波特极高的尊敬，并怀着一种认为哈利在他们谁都不能完全理解的使命中始终需要帮助的信念，后来便把地图送给了哈利，不经意间也刚好将地图传给了其创作者之一之子的手上。
　　后来，地图又被霍格沃茨内一名伪装的食死徒从哈利手上没收，因为他认为这地图很可能会成为他个人新发现的一个来源。

　　罗琳的想法：
　　后来，活点地图对创始人来说（即我）成为了某种类似于祸害的东西，因为它使哈利有些太过于信息自由了。我从未交待哈利如何从（所谓的）疯眼汉穆迪的空办公室中取回地图的细节，而我有时也后悔没有利用好这一错误而只是任由它去。不过，我很喜欢《死亡圣器》里哈利盯着金妮的小圆点在校内移动时的场景，所以总的来说我很高兴哈利重获了他所应得的地图。

　　【Marauder's Map By J.K. Rowling】
Perhaps no students (even including Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, Hermione Granger and Tom Riddle) have ever explored the castle and grounds of Hogwarts as thoroughly and illicitly as the four creators and contributors to the Marauder's Map: James Potter, Sirius Black, Remus Lupin and Peter Pettigrew.
James, Sirius and Peter were not initially impelled to explore the school grounds by night out of devilment alone (though that played its part), but by their desire to help their dear friend Remus Lupin to bear his lycanthropy. Prior to the invention of the Wolfsbane Potion, Lupin was compelled to undergo an excruciating transformation every full moon. Once his condition was discovered by his three best friends, they sought a way to render his transformations less solitary and painful, which led to them learning to become (unregistered) Animagi, so that they could keep him company without harm to themselves. The ability of Sirius Black, Peter Pettigrew and James Potter to become, respectively, a dog, a rat and a stag, enabled them to explore the castle grounds by night undetected. The interior of the castle, meanwhile, was mapped over time with the help of James Potter's Invisibility Cloak.
The Marauder's Map is lasting testimony to the advanced magical ability of the four friends who included Harry Potter's father, godfather and favourite teacher. The map they created during their time at Hogwarts appears to be a blank piece of parchment unless activated by the phrase: I solemnly swear that I am up to no good, a phrase that, in the case of three of the four makers, should be understood as a joke. The 'no good' of which they wrote never denoted Dark magic, but school rule-breaking; similar bravado is evinced by their use of their own nicknames on the map ('Messrs Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs').
The magic used in the map's creation is advanced and impressive; it includes the Homonculous Charm, enabling the possessor of the map to track the movements of every person in the castle, and it was also enchanted to forever repel (as insultingly as possible) the curiosity of their nemesis, Severus Snape.
Although the precise circumstances surrounding the makers' loss of their map are not given in the Harry Potter novels, it is easy to conclude that they eventually over-reached themselves and were cornered by Argus Filch, probably on a tip-off from Snape, whose obsession it had become to expose his arch-rival, James Potter, in wrongdoing. The masterpiece of a map was confiscated in Sirius, James, Remus and Peter's final year and none of them were able to steal it back from a well-prepared and suspicious Filch. In any case, their priorities changed in their final months at school, becoming far more serious and focused on the world beyond Hogwarts, where Lord Voldemort was successfully rising to power. All four of the map's creators would shortly be inducted into the renegade organisation headed by Albus Dumbledore, the Order of the Phoenix, and a map of their old school - no matter how ingenious - would no longer be of use to them except as a piece of nostalgia.
The Marauder's Map was, however, of immense use to the young Weasley twins. The story of Fred and George's acquisition of the map is told in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. It was a mark of their high esteem for Harry Potter, and their belief that he stood in need of assistance with a destiny none of them yet fully understood, that they later gifted the map to him, unwittingly passing it on to the child of one of the creators.
The map was subsequently confiscated from Harry Potter by a Death Eater in disguise at the school, who recognised it as a likely source of his own discovery.
J.K. Rowling's thoughts
The Marauder's Map subsequently became something of a bane to its true originator (me), because it allowed Harry a little too much freedom of information. I never showed Harry taking the map back from the empty office of (the supposed) Mad-Eye Moody, and I sometimes regretted that I had not capitalised on this mistake to leave it there. However, I like the moment when Harry watches Ginny's dot moving around the school in Deathly Hallows, so on balance I am glad I let Harry reclaim his rightful property.