Backwoods Witchcraft

Author: Jake Richards
Publisher: Weiser Books
ISBN: 1633411117
Category : Body, Mind & Spirit
Languages : en
Pages : 240

Book Description
In Backwoods Witchcraft, Jake Richards offers up a folksy stew of family stories, lore, omens, rituals, and conjure crafts that he learned from his great-grandmother, his grandmother, and his grandfather, a Baptist minister who Jake remembers could "rid someone of a fever with an egg or stop up the blood in a wound." The witchcraft practiced in Appalachia is very much a folk magic of place, a tradition that honors the seen and unseen beings that inhabit the land as well as the soil, roots, and plant life. The materials and tools used in Appalachia witchcraft are readily available from the land. This "grounded approach" will be of keen interest to witches and conjure folk regardless of where they live. Readers will be guided in how to build relationships with the spirits and other beings that dwell around them and how to use the materials and tools that are readily available on the land where one lives. This book also provides instructions on how to create a working space and altar and make conjure oils and powders. A wide array of tried-and-true formulas are also offered for creating wealth, protecting one from gossip, spiritual cleansing, and more.

Doctoring the Devil

Author: Jake Richards
Publisher: Weiser Books
ISBN: 1578637333
Category : Body, Mind & Spirit
Languages : en
Pages : 290

Book Description
"Appalachian folk magic and conjure are little known today, but forty or fifty years ago, just about every person you might ask in Appalachia either knew something about it themselves or knew someone who did it. These practices and 'superstitions' are at the core Appalachian culture. Who were the old conjurors and witches of Appalachia? What did they do, believe in, and dress land talk like? How can you learn the ways of conjuring for yourself? This book answers those questions and more"--

Doctoring the Devil

Author: Jake Richards
Publisher: Weiser Books
ISBN: 1633412083
Category : Body, Mind & Spirit
Languages : en
Pages : 290

Book Description
In this “great starting point for those hoping to practice Appalachian folk magic” (Publishers Weekly), conjure man Jake Richards shares the root work practices and traditional magic he learned from his family as he grew up in the hills and hollers of Appalachia. Who were the old conjurors and witches of Appalachia? What were their practices and beliefs? How can you learn the ways of conjuring for yourself? Appalachian folk magic and conjure are little known today, but forty or fifty years ago just about every person you might ask in Appalachia either knew something about it themselves or knew someone who did it. These practices and “superstitions” are at the core of Appalachian culture. In Doctoring the Devil, Jake Richards speaks to those questions and more, offering the various ways of rooting out the “devil”—any unfriendly spirit bringing bad luck, poor health, and calamities of all sorts. Like the blue smoky mists that glide up the Appalachians, Jake leads his readers up the hillsides too, introducing us to folks along the way—hunters, farmers, blacksmiths, faith healers, preachers, and root-diggers. We’ll also meet the local spirits and learn root ways. Further up the hill, we delve into Jake’s notebooks—a personal collection of tried-and-true Appalachian recipes and roots for conjuring love, money, justice, and success.

Conjure Cards

Author: Jake Richards
Publisher: Weiser Books
ISBN: 9781578637447
Category : Body, Mind & Spirit
Languages : en
Pages : 0

Book Description
"For centuries, people living in Appalachia have used homemade playing cards for fortune-telling and dream interpretation. This tradition has arisen over many generations of backwoods conjurers, 'grannie witches,' and 'yarb doctors'. Here, the author has created a fortune-telling deck fashioned after the folklore, superstitions, and dream symbols that he grew up with in Western North Carolina"

Signs, Cures, & Witchery

Author: Gerald Milnes
Publisher: Univ. of Tennessee Press
ISBN: 9781572335776
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 276

Book Description
The persecution of Old World German Protestants and Anabaptists in the seventeenth century--following debilitating wars, the Reformation, and the Inquisition-- brought about significant immigration to America. Many of the immigrants, and their progeny, settled in the Appalachian frontier. Here they established a particularly old set of religious beliefs and traditions based on a strong sense of folk spirituality. They practiced astrology, numerology, and other aspects of esoteric thinking and left a legacy that may still be found in Appalachian folklore today. Based in part on the author's extensive collection of oral histories from the remote highlands of West Virginia, Signs, Cures, and Witchery; German Appalachian Folklore describes these various occult practices, symbols, and beliefs; how they evolved within New World religious contexts; how they arrived on the Appalachian frontier; and the prospects of those beliefs continuing in the contemporary world. By concentrating on these inheritances, Gerald C. Milnes draws a larger picture of the German influence on Appalachia. Much has been written about the Anglo-Celtic, Scots-Irish, and English folkways of the Appalachian people, but few studies have addressed their German cultural attributes and sensibilities. Signs, Cures, and Witchery sheds startling light on folk influences from Germany, making it a volume of tremendous value to Appalachian scholars, folklorists, and readers with an interest in Appalachian folklife and German American studies.

Mountain Conjure and Southern Root Work

Author: Orion Foxwood
Publisher: Weiser Books
ISBN: 1633412105
Category : Body, Mind & Spirit
Languages : en
Pages : 258

Book Description
Traditional Southern root magic and conjure from someone who learned the old ways growing up in rural Appalachia. Folk magic conjurer and root worker Orion Foxwood invites you to take a walk through his native Appalachia, through moonlit orchards and rural farms, to the dark of the crossroads. From the oral tradition of his ancestors to the voices of the spirits themselves, Foxwood brings readers the secrets of Southern magic: • Working by the signs (the ability to synchronize work such as farming, fertility, and orcharding) •Faith healing •Settling the light (candle magic) •Doctoring the root (the ability to use herbs, roots, stones, or animal parts for magic or for clearing, cleansing, and blessing a person) •Praying or dreaming true (blessings of spirit/God to a person, place, or thing as well as prophetic or predictive dreaming) •Blessing or cursing Mountain Conjure and Southern Root Work shows how to create magic in today’s world with the old ways and traditions of Appalachia. This book was previously published as The Candle and the Crosswords. This new edition includes a foreword by Mat Auryn, author of Psychic Witch.

The Candle and the Crossroads

Author: Orion Foxwood
Publisher: Weiser Books
ISBN: 1609258010
Category : Body, Mind & Spirit
Languages : en
Pages : 258

Book Description
Learn the ways of magic and healing from the living, oral tradition of Appalachian Conjure in The Candle and the Crossroads. Orion Foxwood offers a primer on the real magic and techniques of Southern root magic, knowledge he learned first-hand growing up in rural Appalachia. Foxwood explains magical techniques including: Spirit SightWorking by the Signs (the ability to synchronize work such as farming, fertility of humans and animals, orcharding)ConjuringFaith HealingSettling the Light (candle magic)Doctoring the Root (the ability to use herbs, roots, stones, or animal parts—bones, claws, fur, etc. for magic or the clearing, cleansing, and blessing of the spirit of a person, also known as his or her root)Praying or Dreaming True (Blessings of spirit/God to a person, place, or thing as well as prophetic or predictive dreaming)Blessing or Cursing The Candle and the Crossroads shows how to create magic in today’s world with the old ways and traditions of Appalachia.

American Brujeria

Author: J. Allen Cross
Publisher: Red Wheel/Weiser
ISBN: 1578637457
Category : Body, Mind & Spirit
Languages : en
Pages : 242

Book Description
"This book focuses on the blend of American and Mexican folk magic currently being used by those living in the US but whose roots are in the Mexican culture. This type of Mexican-American folk magic contains its own unique saints and spirits, as well as the more familiar, such as the infamous Santa Muerte. It is extremely similar to Conjure traditions of the American south and, in fact, shares a lot of crossover, demonstrating how these traditions have influenced one another"--

A Storm of Witchcraft

Author: Emerson W. Baker
Publisher: Pivotal Moments in American Hi
ISBN: 019989034X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 415

Book Description
Presents an historical analysis of the Salem witch trials, examining the factors that may have led to the mass hysteria, including a possible occurrence of ergot poisoning, a frontier war in Maine, and local political rivalries.

Southern Cunning

Author: Aaron Oberon
Publisher: John Hunt Publishing
ISBN: 178904197X
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 163

Book Description
Southern Cunning is a journey through the folklore of the American South and a look at the power these stories hold for modern witches. Through the lens of folklore, animism, and bioregionalism the book shows how to bring rituals in folklore into the modern day and presents a uniquely American approach to witchcraft born out of the land and practical application.