Browse:Part of Spirit Equals Whole of Spirit (Volume 1, entries 24–33)
Part of Spirit Equals Whole of Spirit
Volume 1, entries 24–33. Source context: SPIRITS → GHOSTLORE. Entries listed under this heading in the source volume.
Entries
Entry 24
[There used to be a mathematical axiom stating that the whole is the sumn of all its parts. In hoodoo, however, a part can equal the whole. Every part and function of your body (hair and breath) - anything touching you (clothes and bathwater) - whatever signifies you (name and photograph) - all these and others are substitutes for either the whole or part of the spirit. Many examples of this belief will be found elsewhere - here are a few:]
Entry 25
Yo' could write a person name on a piece of papah an' throw it ovahbo'd an' it would cause dem to go. It would cause dem to jump ovahbo'd - jes' like yo' throw it in a rivah, it would cause dem to go an' jump in de rivah.
Entry 26
Get a little box - a tin box. Put dat toenails in there and fingernails in there, cayenne pepper, war water - you get the war water, devil dust. You puts in there and you stop that can up tight, you see, and bury it. Den when you bury it, the person what it belongs to, their hand'll come like that - they'll draw up.
(Draw up - drawn up.)
Yeah, all drawn up. If it stay longer, the more it draw. They won't be no use for theirself.
(What is devil dust?)
Devil dust is what you get in the [hoodoo] drug store.
Entry 27
Take your handwritin' - see, de handwritin' where it was writ wit ink or lead. Dey take it and soak it in water and get dat ink, get dat ink off it from your handwritin'. Den dey will take dat water and boil it. See. Den take dat water and pour it out gradually - don't pour dat all at one time, fes' kinda sprinkle it along. When dat water pour out chew begin tuh feel bad - yo' hand begin to feel nervous up thru yo' arms and finally, if you don't know what to do, yo' become paralyzed in your right hand.
Entry 28
A man, he tole me his ole lady went outdoors one night an' went to her chicken coop an' got a big sack fulla chicken dirt - taken it in de house an' taken ashes out de fireplace an' taken his underwears an' rolled dis stuff up in it an' taken - yo' know, rolled it ovah. Didn't mess wit it any Way at all - jes' rolled it ovah an' take it out an' carried it to his bed an' washed his feet, an' let de watah drene off his feet into that ashes an' chicken stuff, an' says, he can't even walk now. Says, lak if he walks, seems lak needles stickin' in him.
(Was he asleep - she did that while he was asleep?)
No, he wusn't asleep - he jes' thought she wus washin' his feet. Dat's all, but he had noticed dat.
Entry 29
Dey tell me dat dey kin take yore bath water and bury it. Dig a hole and pore it in dere and put a piece of - jest a small piece of bluestone, sulphur an' asafitadee [assafetida] in dat hole with dat water and cover it up. And dey tell me dat will keep yo' perishing away all de time.
Entry 30
I was on a island 'tween here and West Point, Virginia. Dere come a little white fellow from Danville County for to see one of Capt. Dick Coleman's daughters - first cousins, too, but he was loving her. He goes up a tree - he drawed de other man's pitchure on de ground - I don't know as you wanta hear that.
(Yes, I want to hear it - yes.)
He draws his pitchure on de ground - de other man pitchure, because he wanted her himself. He draws the pitchure on de ground and he goes up a tree right at sunrise and he shot at dat picture - that is to kill the man. Way up yonder he shot at dat pitchure.
(He went up in the tree and shot down at the picture - shot down?)
Shot down on de pitchure.
(He lust drew it in the ground - with a stick or something?)
Yes, just drew him on de ground and den go up de tree with a pistol, you know, for to try to shoot him in de heart. If he shot him in de heart - up here where he drawed that there - then he'd akilled that man up in [some place]. But he didn't do it, you see - struck him all around de edges of his clothes, arms and places. If that ball hadda struck him in de heart where he drawed it, he would have killed him instantly.
(You say a white man did this?)
Yes.
(Well, whom was he doing it for - another white man or - )
He was doing it fer himself.
(Doing it for himself.)
Doing it for himself - I seen him do it. I was with him.
(What island was this on - what was the name of the island?)
Purtain - Pertin Island.
(Purtin Island - that's in the James River?)
York River.
(Oh, the York River. I see. How long ago did that happen?)
Oh, that happened now - over thirty years ago [1906-7] about de shootin'.
Entry 31
If they kin [get] hold of it, they kin take your photograph and shoot it - shoot it.
(What will that do?)
That will afflict you - 'cause I knowed a lady one time, somebody stole her pitchure. And she used to wear a piece over her eye, see. So I asked her, I says, what's de matter with her eye. [She] say, well, somebody stole her pit- chure and shot her in de eye. She was called a hoodoo and I was afraid of her. Yes, they shot her in de eye. That's the reason that she wear dat piece over her eye.
Entry 32
During my childhood days I heard that a sick person who was very troublesome and worried them and worth a little money, the only thing you could do to stop the law from coming into it, this person went to a hoodoo and he told her to take this person's picture and turn it upside down under the [sick] bed and watch its effect. In three days the person was a corpse. You turn a photo- graph down like that and you watch the person and see if he don't get weaker every day. When you lay it down you are turning the life down like that.
Entry 33
Ah had a little boy home but ah stayed off about seven years, an' he wanted tuh see me awful bad. Ah went home but ah didn't know de cause of it - ah goes without any thoughts whatever - just picked up unconcerned an' went home. An' when ah got home ah found my picture standing on it's head and the grand- mother said that he said that would bring me home. It must have some powder. [She is mistaken - standing on it's head is sufficient.] So I did go home.
(Your son did this?)
Yes.
(Was the picture facing out or facing in to the wall?)
It was facing out.