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The world of Harry Potter is filled with all sorts of places where an aspiring young wizard can get an education. Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry is certainly going to be a favourite choice for many Harry Potter fans, but there are lots of different options across the world.
One of the most prominent of these is Durmstrang Instititue for Magical Learning, which fans first learn about in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. As one of the schools competing in the Triwizard Tournament, fans get a lot of hands-on time with them through Harry's eyes, and an insight into their ways.
8 It's Not An All-Boys School
One of the ways the filmmakers of Goblet of Fire looked to differentiate the two magical schools of Durmstrang and Beauxbatons is by dividing them down gender lines. Beauxbatons is depicted as an overly-feminine all-girls school, while Durmstrang is an overtly masculin all-boys school.
In the books, this simply isn't the case, and there are several instances of female Durmstrang students being noted. The school was actually founded by a woman, Nerida Vulchanova, some time before the first Triwizard Tournament in 1294.
7 Does Not Admit Muggle-Borns
Durmstrang has long been seen as a bit behind-the-times in the wizarding world for a number of reasons, and this is one of the biggest. Unlike most other wizarding schools, Durmstrang still relishes traditional values and "the old ways" and thus doesn't allow muggle-born wizards or witches to attend their school.
While the institution hangs on to these ideals of blood supremacy, it doesn't seem to be actively taught in the school. Plenty of Durmstrang students are shown to be very friendly to muggle-borns from other schools, especially Viktor Krum romancing Hermione Granger.
6 Unknown, Unplottable Location
Magical schools are highly protective of their secrets, and none more so than their locations. All schools go to great lengths to protect their location, to stop unfriendly forces popping in for a visit. Durmstrang is known to be located somewhere in Bulgaria, but that's as specific as it gets.
Additionally, like most other magical schools, enchantments are placed on the school to make it unplottable. This means that it can never appear on a map of any kind. This means little is known about the design of the place either. The vague descriptions fans get is that it's a castle, but smaller than Hogwarts, and surrounded by lakes and mountains. This means it's hard to visit the location in real life, unlike some other wizarding world landmarks.
5 Teaches the Dark Arts
Another feature that makes other schools look down upon Durmstrang is their educational system having classes on the use of Dark Magic. There are all kinds of spells and curses that are looked down upon, or outright forbidden in other areas of the wizarding world, but Durmstrang proudly teaches them to students.
It's unclear exactly how far their classes go, but they do have a limit, as some students have been expelled for going too far. Based on this, the assumption can be made that the darkest of dark arts, like Horcruxes, would be forbidden knowledge, but something like the Unforgivable Curses might be okay.
4 Igor Karkaroff Sunk the School's Reputation
While the school was already looked down upon for its dark ways, there was always a sense of plausible deniability, and no one believed the students were Death Eaters in training. Unfortunately, that benefit of the doubt was lost when Igor Karkaroff became headmaster.
Karkaroff is a skilled wizard, but was a Death Eater who fought loyally by Voldemorts' side in the first wizarding war. He was sent to Azkaban prison after the war, but was eventually set free after selling out his fellow Death Eaters to the Ministry of Magic. Having such a shady character running the school did no favors for its reputation.
3 Grindelwald Attended
Inarguably Durmstrang's most infamous student, Gellert Grindelwald got his magical education at the school. The young dark wizard was entirely absorbed by the culture there, which focused on being the strongest, and power ruling over all else.
After Grindelwald had a vision of his dominance over wizards and muggles alike, he began to ramp up his experiments into dark magic. Unfortunately, he pushed things too far and began to be seen as a threat to other students and expelled. He cast the mark of the Deathly Hallows onto a wall there before he left, and it was imbued with such powerful dark magic that it could not be removed for over a century.
2 Draco Malfoy Almost Went There
Being a school focused so heavily focused on dark magic and aligning with the Death Eater's views on blood supremacy, it's no surprise that Lucius Malfoy would want his son to go there. Lucius was one of Voldemort's most loyal followers, and he wanted his son, Draco to be brought up with the same values as him.
In addition, Igor Karkaroff was headmaster there by that point, and no doubt Lucius trusted him as former Death Eater to keep things as they were and treat Draco well. This idea was eventually stopped, though, when Draco's mother insisted she didn't want her son so far from home all year.
1 They've Never Won The Triwizard Tournament
It seems laughable that, in a competition with only three participants, one of the schools would go its entire history without winning, but that appears to be the case. It is stated that Beauxbatons have 63 wins, and Hogwarts have 62. Durmstrang aren't mentioned, however, fans can work backward.
The first tournament was in 1294, and the last before it was scrapped the first time was in 1792. Counting backward through the centuries for years that would've held a tournament shows that the combined 125 wins of Beauxbatons and Hogwarts account for every single tournament to ever take place. This means Durmstrang, quite laughably, has never succeeded in the event.