Meaning of こともあろう

Question

やつに人間らしさのかけらでも残っていれば死ぬこともあろうさ (Japanese Harry Potter TL)
Dunno if he had enough human left in him to die. (Original book)
If even a trace of humanity remains in him, he might even die. (My TL attempt)

I may be wrong, but I'm pretty sure the Japanese sentence does not convey the original meaning at all, but that's a separate issue.

My main concern is that I'm struggling with the meaning/nuance of 死ぬこともあろう in this sentence. My literal breakdown is

死ぬこと an event where he dies
死ぬことも even an event where he dies
死ぬこともある there exists even an event where he dies
死ぬこともあろう there might exist even an event where he dies (I'm guessing the volitional form adds some conjecture like with だろう)

Hence my final translation of "he might even die".

Is this even close to the truth? How would it differ if the sentence were simply 死ぬだろう?

Answer 1

Your breakdown seems correct but your final translation doesn’t sound quite right. I think it’s because of “even.”

も puts what it marks in the same category as other things, which are often not stated explicitly. In this case, the event of him dying is included in the speaker’s speculation among other possibilities. “He might even die” sounds like him dying is a less likely scenario and even that less likely scenario is possible. The Japanese sentence doesn’t have this nuance. It implies the speaker wouldn’t be surprised if it had happened (supposing a trace of humanity remained in him).

死ぬだろう means the speaker is reasonably certain he is going to die.

In any case, you are correct about the sentence not conveying the meaning of the original, where the speaker seems to doubt he died. I’m not sure how they ended up with this translation after having translated the preceding lines with reasonable accuracy.

Some say he died.
やつが死んだと言う者も居る。

Codswallop, in my opinion.
そんなのは、たわごとにしか過ぎん。

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The sentence might have been meant as a contrapositive statement suggesting the speaker didn't think he had even a trace of humanity left in him, but it's a bit hard to understand, especially for young readers. あるかもしれないが, just for example, would have made this meaning much clearer. Or even just replacing the final さ with が would have made a huge difference.

Answer 2

I think this も is a special type of も that adds the nuance of "naturally", "of course", or "no wonder. This 死ぬこともあろう can be translated as "naturally, he would die". It's described in the following questions:

• かわりもしますよ what is the meaning of this も?
• Using も alone to mean 当然 / “naturally”
• Structure of ～くもなろうものだ

あろう is the "volitional" form of ある, and you're right that it's used here as an inferential marker (∼死ぬだろう). You can also say 死にもしよう(さ) here.