Harry's death foreshadowed in Book 1?

[Marvolo]

Could Harry's death at Voldemort's hand have been foreshadowed in Book 1?

On page 260 of SS, right after Harry has come back from the Forbidden Forest, he is discussing with Ron and Hermoine his experience. He is telling them about his discussions with the centaurs, in particular Firenze's arguement with Bane.

About halfway down the page, Harry says, "Bane thinks Firenze should have let Voldemort kill me....I suppose that's written in the stars as well."

What if the fact that Voldemort is supposed to kill Harry was indeed written in the stars? McGonagal says that divination is the most imprecise branch of magic, and it seems reasonable that even diviners such as centaurs could have mixed up what the stars were saying, getting the date of Harry's death wrong by 5 or 6 years. This would explain why Bane was so mad; he saw Harry's death at Voldemort's hand in the stars and believed that Firenze had just tampered with the willings of fate, when the stars really said that Voldemort would kill Harry in 5 or 6 more years.

Of course, this is not concrete, but since Rowling rarely gives us concrete evidence, I believe it is a plausible theory.

The stars are probably vague on that and Bane interpreted it to mean that Harry would die. We know one must kill the other before the series is through, so the stars are probably just foreshadowing the battle.

 

[Majimaune]

Yeah that is a good point, that Bane interpreted wrong. It says one will die and Bane just instantly assumed Harry because he possibley believed that Voldy dead and gone.

 

[Crazihors]

Anyway, just to add my opinion, I've never really seen that as direct forshadowing; rather the bit about not interfering in the events predestined struck me as the bit to remember. I always thought it meant Harry needed to live, learn to fight his own battles, and use these experiences to aid him, rather than have a centaur rescue him, thus not giving Harry any chance to learn.

Harry's never had to fight his own battles - not alone anyway
1. Hermy and Ron help until Quirrellmort, and then Dumbles interferes before harry has chance to die.
2.Fawkes and the sorting hat come to the rescue and AGAIN harry doesn't die.
3. Sirius came to the rescue against the werewolf, and only the future harry stopped the KoD being performed on his past self
4. the shadowy figures from the end of voldie's wand are the only thing to prevent him from dying....which is getting rather annoying by now
5. The Order come storming in just as he's about to die again, and even before that members of the DA are with him
6. Dumbles freezes Harry so he can't get himself killed, and Voldie himself has ordered the Death Eaters not to touch him.

anyway, back to the topic...it probably is one of those important, easily overlooked things - like Sirius' mentions of his brother before the RAB letter. McGonagall isn't the only one to mention that centaur divination is imprecise, though - Firenze says himself when he is teaching that they can only get glimpses of what is to come, rather than the whole story of when where and how - not exact, but i'm saving reading the books till the 12th.
other centaur predictions come true - Bane explains that 'Mars is bright tonight' means that they are in between two wars - we found out that in Gof/OotP.