Subject:Tinfoil
Entries
Entry 12186
(What do you do to keep the law away from a place? The law - to keep the police away?) The policeman?
(Yes.)
Well, I knows some of them puts a cross up on the side of their door.
(What kind of a cross?)
[Informant evidently thought a cross is a cross and I did not insist.]
A horseshoe - you know them horseshoe - a cross. They either take a horseshoe or either they has some silver - just like that is. [He pulls out a piece of tinfoil.1 Take a brand-new that never has walked on [an unusual expression] you see, that never been used. And be sure it's a brand-new piece. Put that there and put that horsefeet [horseshoe] up- side down [prongs or toes up]. The law will never come there. [Do not use tin- foil picked up from street or off floor. For tinfoil from street see No.12192.]
(Just one horseshoe?)
Yes. He [policeman] pass right on by there.
Entry 12192
Said they git three horseshoes, an' go in de street an' pick [up] cigaret pack, an' git de tinsel [tinfoil] offen dere an' cover dose horseshoes up, an' bury 'em undah de step of de house. Dat will make dem move out. (You take three whole horseshoes and cover them with this tinfoil, and you bury them under the steps?) Yessuh. [For tinfoil not from street, see 12186.]
Entry 8293
[Quicksilver in hoodoo is rarely the. metallic element mercury; it is usually tin foil, or scrapings from the metallic amalgram backing a mirror. There are other examples of this quicksilver in Hoodoo, and perhaps one or two of the real substance.] Ah said dey take a gun an' load it wit quicksilvah an' shoot chure pichure, in yo' arm or somepin lak dat. Make a card, don't chew undahstand, an' if yo' don' do somepin fer it, why it will jis' keep arottin' an' rottin' till it ruin yo', yo' undahstand, wit bloodpoison. (How could you shoot quicksilver in a gun?) Take yore [gun] powdah an' put it in dere an' den yo' pack it. Now yo' [add] buckshot. Den yo' take yo' quicksilvah lak dat [put these 3 things in gun or shell] don't chew undahstand, an' put it in de gun.