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Black Cats
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BLACK CAT SPELLS and BLACK CAT SPIRITUAL SUPPLIES
Black cats are considered very unlucky in the European and
European-American traditions. Among Anglo-Saxons and Scandinavian
people, it is said that one sets out on a journey and a black cat
crosses the road ahead, one's only safe course of action is to
turn back and return home. Tales of shape-shifting black cats and
black cats who are in communication with the Devil are also a
feature of European folk-belief. Concommitant with these negative
feelings about black cats is the notion that they are
particularly favoured as witches' familiars -- hence their almost
universal use on Hallowe'en decorations.
In bright contrast to this image of the "evil" black cat, there
is a "good" black cat -- the antinomian lucky black cat
of the African-American sporting and gambling world. This black
cat does double-duty as a representative of the black arts (including
the granting of invisibility and the return of lost love) and as
a bringer of money luck.
In the form of a figural
candle, the black cat is burned in rituals designed to
increase gambler's luck. Hoodoo products, such as the Lucky Mojo Brand Black Cat
Sachet Powder, Black Cat Bath
Crystals, Black Cat Dressing Oil, and Black
Cat Incense shown here, are also popular with gamblers,
especially those who play at cards and bet the lottery. In
addition, a popular style of mojo
bag for gamblers is the so-called Black Cat Curio Bag,
which is decorated with a small black cat charm on the
outside and filled with a variety of luck-bringing roots and
herbs, including John the
Conqueror root.
THE BLACK CAT BONE SPELL
The notorious black cat bone charm is a subject
with which i am, frankly, rather uncomfortable.
Although it is strongly identified with
African American hoodoo ,
its origins are actually in European grimoire magic.
Here, thanks to Mike Rock, is a copy of the way it appears
in an English translation of the Portuguese grimoire of
Saint Cyprian of Antioch:
"Cook the body of a black cat in boiling water with white seeds and
wood from the willow until the meat is loosened from the bones.
Strain the bones in a linen cloth and, in front of the mirror, place
the bones, one by one in your mouth, until you find that you have the
magic to make you become invisible. Keep the bone with the magic
property and, if you want to go somewhere without being seen, place
the bone in your mouth."
http://www.portcult.com/SAINT_CYPRIAN.05.MAGIC.SPELLS.htm
The African American novelist and folklorist Zora Neale
Hurston, who studied hoodoo in
Florida and Louisiana in the 1930s, and Harry Middleton Hyatt, who collected
over 13,000 individual spells from 1600 African American informants throughout the
South in the same time period, reported at length on the many
root doctors who claimed that every black cat has within its body
one bone that will either grant the owner invisibility or can be
used to bring back a lost lover.
To secure this bone, they said, a black cat
must be thrown alive into a cauldron of boiling water at
midnight. The animal dies in agony, and the heartless
practitioner boils the carcass until the meat falls off the
bones. Some say that the special bone will be the top one left
when the water boils away, others say it can only be found by
placing each bone in turn beneath the tongue while an assistant
stands by to notify the practitioner that he has become invisible,
and still others swear that if all the bones are thrown into a
stream that runs north (uncommon in most of North America), the
desired bone will be one that floats on the water
and heads south.
Once found, the black cat bone is carried in a mojo bag and anointed with Van Van
Oil to bring back a lost lover. The oil or fat of the cat
is bottled for use as a candle dressing and for anointing
gambler's charms. Hurston claimed to have participated in the
ritual killing of a black cat for this purpose -- but she did not
reveal whether her lost lover returned to her. (For several much
more congenial ways to return a lost lover,
see the page on love spells.)
The reputation of the black cat bone spell is so great that even
today, when animal sacrifice is not condoned by society, several
hoodoo supply companies offer
black cat bones and black cat oil in their catalogues. Out of
curiousity, i bought a so-called black cat bone mojo bag and a vial of black cat oil
from one supplier and was amused to see that the bone in question
was the broken end of a chicken thigh that had been spray-painted
black, while the oil was lightly fragranced mineral oil. I was
relieved to learn that no cats had been killed to satisfy my
curiousity -- but amazed at the arrogance of the lie that was
being perpetuated by the seller, who also offers bat's hearts,
cat's eyes, and swallow's hearts for sale -- undoubtedly all
gallinaceous in origin (unless the "cat's eyes" are really cat's eye shells, which come from a
mollusk).
BLACK CAT SPIRITUAL SUPPLIES
During the 1930s, when the belief that an
elephant
statue with its trunk upward was lucky became endemic in the USA,
the "trunk up" belief was spread to the black cat
with "tail up" as well and
magic candles
in the form of a black cat
with tail up began appearing in mail order
hoodoo catalogues in
the 1940s, if not earlier. However, tail up black cat
statues did not become popular -- probably becasue there was so
much "bad luck" attached to them in the general population --
so black cat figural
hoodoo candles, which are generally
burned for luck in
gambling, are all that remain of this belief.
In researching the traditional formulas used for
hoodoo style
oils,
incenses,
bath crystals, and
sachet powders,
it became obvious to me that some sort of Black Cat Brand product
would be wanted by gamblers and practitioners of the dark arts.
However, because i am not willing to kill cats -- nor to lie to
the public by selling painted chicken bones -- i have originated
a Black Cat formula that contains black cat hair and certain
botanical substances and am selling this authentic preparation
under the Lucky Mojo
brand name.
At the time of this writing, three black cats supply
all the hair used in these products, courtesy of their owners,
who collect it while grooming them. These cats are Mama, Santana, and Little
Black Cat (owned by my friends and family members). The Lucky Mojo Black Cat
label is adapted from vintage packaging of the 1930s.
Order Black Cat Oil from the Lucky Mojo Curio Co.
Order Black Cat Incense from the Lucky Mojo Curio Co.
Order Black Cat Bath Crystals from the Lucky Mojo Curio Co.
Order Black Cat Sachet Powder from the Lucky Mojo Curio Co.
Order Black Cat Vigil Light Candles from the Lucky Mojo Curio Co.
Order a Black Cat Spell Kit from the Lucky Mojo Curio Co.
Order a Black Cat Mojo Bag from the Lucky Mojo Curio Co.
For more pages on cats, see:
cats, black
black cat on Lucky Mon-Gol Curio Number XI
black cat figural candles
black cat image on hoodoo votive candles
black cat on Sonny Boy hoodoo oils and incenses
black cat on Mexican package amulet
black cat bone in hoodoo conjure bags
cat's eye shell as evil eye protectant
the Beckoning Cat or money-drawing cat of Japan
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