Hyatt Hoodoo Collection: INTRODUCTION
catherine yronwode
"Hoodoo-Conjuration-Witchcraft-Rootwork" is a 5-volume, 1500 page
collection of folkloric material collected by Harry Middleton Hyatt,
primarily between 1935 and 1939. Most of Hyatt's informants were
African-Americans, but a few European-American hoodoo practitioners were
also interviewed. The material -- consisting of 13,458 separate magic
spells and folkloric beliefs collected in Alabama, Arkansas, Florida,
Georgia, Illinois, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, North Carolina,
South Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia -- was recorded by Hyatt on
Edison cylinders and then transcribed for publication, which was
accomplished between 1965 and 1974.
I am posting some of the spells Hyatt collected to these newsgroups:
news:alt.lucky.w (folk magic and good luck charms of all cultures)
news:alt.religion.orisha (African and African-diaspora religions)
news:alt.pagan.magick (primarily European and European-American folk
magic)
news:alt.paranormal.spells.hexes.magic (exchanges of spells and
conjurations)
news:alt.culture.african.american (African-American culture)
If a specific topic warrants, i will also crosspost selected spells to
news:alt.folklore.herbs (folkoric medical and magical uses of plants)
news:rec.music.bluenote.blues (hoodoo terms encountered in blues lyrics)
NOTE: Any words in (parentheses) in the text were spoken aloud by Hyatt
during the interviews and any words in [brackets] were his written
commentary to the publication. MY OWN further comments, if any, appear
in [[double brackets]].
WARNING: Hyatt, who was a white man, transcribed the speech of his
informants semi-phonetically. What may look to modern eyes like "racial
stereotyping" or making fun of Southern dialects was actually his
sincere attempt to catalogue variant regional pronunciations. If you
read several spells, you will see that he does NOT impose upon his
informants one single stereotyped "black dialect" but in fact conveys,
as accurately as he can, the true sound of each person's speech. Reading
the spells aloud and noting the location where each informant lived will
help you comprehend this. I do not intend to apologize for Hyatt's
technique, and i hope that future scholars of this material will not do
so either.
The above explantory material will appear at the END of each spell as it
is posted, so that new readers will be able to place it in context.
catherine yronwode
http://www.luckymojo.com
Mojo Catalogue: http://www.luckymojo.com/luckymojocatalogue.html
The Lucky W Amulet Archive: http://www.luckymojo.com/LuckyW.html
Sacred Sex: http://www.luckymojo.com/sacredsex.html
The Sacred Landscape: http://www.luckymojo.com/sacredland.html
Freemasonry for Women: http://www.luckymojo.com/CoMasonry.html
Comics Warehouse: http://www.luckymojo.com/comicswarehouse.html
check out news:alt.lucky.w for folk magic and good luck charms
catherine yronwode
Eoghan Craig Ballard wrote:
>
> <c...@luckymojo.com> wrote:
>
> > "Hoodoo-Conjuration-Witchcraft-Rootwork" is a 5-volume, 1500 page
> > collection of folkloric material collected by Harry Middleton Hyatt,
> > I am posting some of the spells Hyatt collected...
> I have looked through the Hyatt collection, and as a trained
> folklorist have found it somewhat daunting to read. I am very aware of
> its signficiance as well as and in spite of its faults.
Folks, this is an understatement. I am not an academic, so i can tell it
like it is ;-) -- the darned thing is a MESS!!!! It has NO INDEX!!!!!!!
But amidst the 13,400-some spells, there is SO MUCH of cultural and
magical interest that one could base a decade's worth of scholarly work
on it. I have read it cover to cover to cover to cover (et cetera for
five volumes) and put little paper slips in pages and i am STILL finding
material i have overlooked.
> I am quite eager to see your postings and especially your explanations
> of this material. You have a store of knowledge in this area and
> imagine that not only what you choose but what you say about it will
> be quite valuable.
Why, gee -- thanks. I will not be annotating it too heavily, except to
correct Hyatt's characteristic transcription errors (more on this later,
but to give one example of many, he invariably mis-transcribed Hoyt's
Cologne -- a brand name, still manufactured, and much used in hoodoo --
as "Hearts Cologne").
For the most part, though, i really intend to let the informants speak
for themselves. One contribution i will be making is to organize the
material i pull out into broad topics. Hyatt sorta did this too, but, as
you know, a wealth of chaos is encompassed in the word "sorta." I will
also be continually referencing the material to blues songs and other
folkloric sources. As it is selected, it will go onto my web pages,
where it will be hyper-linked in a useful way that Hyatt could not
accomplish in the pre-html days of yore.
> Perhaps at some time we could prevail upon you to comment about
> Mules and Men from the perspective of general Southern Rootworking and
> Hoodoo.
I think it would be very interesting to compare Hyatt's Florida and New
Orleans informants with Zora Neale Hurston's accounts --- especially
since they are virtually contemporaneous.
> Your views on what were Hurston's contributions and what were
> Hurston's informants' would be interesting.
This is a difficult issue. It brings up questions of race relations and
novelistic intent versus folkloristic intent. Hyatt was a white man
interviewing black people for the most part, and their
culturally-imposed deference toward him comes through in occasional
"Yassuh" type replies to his questions. Hurston, on the other hand, was
a Florida-born black woman who returned to the South to apprentice
herself to black rootworkers in Florida and Louisiana. In theory, then,
her material would be more accurate, less mediated by cultural problems,
and more respectful of its sources. However, while Hyatt was an amateur
folklorist (much like myself), Hurston was a novelist. There is a
definite tinge of drama in her accounts that cannot be attributed solely
to the dramatic events she witnessed. Like i said, it will be
interesting, when all this stuff gets online (as it surely will in due
time) to hyper-link and compare the Florida and Louisiana material where
their collecting efforts overlapped.