Snakes' Shed Skins ~ Filipino Conjure & Rootwork

Various spp.

Snakes - slithering creatures feared by Ibibio, Fon, and other people from Southern Nigeria, frequently play a prominent role in enemy conjure works. The snake species is not crucial as all kinds of snakes worldwide can be used in crossing, such as cursing one's skin to produce certain dermatological disorders.

The shed, along with snake eggs or bones, is used in making goofer dust too.

A cursed powdered shed can also be fed to one's enemy, most often without his knowledge, and can cause small snakes or worms to live inside the enemy's body (similar to what Filipinos call "barang").

Putting snake sheds, combined with salt, black pepper, red pepper, goofer dust, and graveyard dirt, can also cause bad luck, panic attacks, paranoia, and a departure when sprinkled around the victim's home or yard or in shoes, socks, or stockings. Contrariwise, some people place the shed skin around their own property, guarding the perimeter, to keep troublemakers and people with evil motivations and inclination towards them at bay.

This curio can be applied or rubbed on one's penis too (or in a penis figural candle) to cause physical pain and irritation whenever your man tries to get intimate with another woman other than you.

I have known some conjure workers that also utilize snakeskin sheds in break-up or separation works, especially when the couple is difficult to split apart. Wrapping their name papers separately, with snake sheds, black mustard seeds, and guinea peppers, and working them underneath a black candle dressed with Hot Foot, Break-Up, or Crossing oil can cause discord and strife to the couple.

One of my mentors also taught me that snake shed powder can also be used to calm the mind by rubbing them between my hands until it produces heat and blowing them away, together with my negative thoughts, anxieties, nervous conditions, and any mental stress.

Choctaw people and other Native Americans use snake oil, particularly rattlesnake grease, in making liniment for muscle sprains, osteoarthritis, and rheumatism. Cherokees do this by roasting a rattlesnake from the lower half of the body as it is thought to be the fattest portion. Rattlesnakes have a tremendous traditional significance among Native Americans, but the fat of any snake may be employed when doing snake liniments. I know some Hoodoo folks include red pepper, pine oil or turpentine, and camphor for increased effect.

See, What Our Path Is

Being immensely interested in African diaspora religions and Folk Catholicism, we primarily honor our ancestors, Church saints, angels, folk saints, and Afro-Caribbean spirits such as loas and orishas. If we absolutely have to put a label on ourselves, we prefer the label of “Folk Judeo-Christian” as we live according to the customs and traditions of conjure workers and root doctors from the Deep South and syncretic followers of Christ in various nations of the Caribbean and Latin America.

Our spirituality includes West African-based Caribbean-style tradition as well as Esoteric Christianity and Yoruba religion. Generally, we practice Gullah folk magic popularly known in the Deep South as Hoodoo or Lowcountry Voodoo; the ancient wisdom founded by Orunmila in Ile-Ife called Ifa, and a bit of Lihim na Karunungan (Filipino Esotericism or Philippine Mystery Tradition).

Respect, What Hoodoo Is

Despite visible evidence of Central West African, Islamic/Moorish, Native American, Judeo-Christian, European, and even a few East Indian/Hindu, Chinese, and Latino/Caribbean retentions, influences, and admixtures, this does not mean that Hoodoo is an open and unrestricted system of eclectic magic.

Conjure, and Rootwork is rooted in African-American culture and Folk Protestant Christianity. Any practitioners of Hoodoo who did not grow up within African-American culture should still have a fuller understanding and high regard for its origin.

In the beginning, the early conjure doctors were entirely Black. The students were all Black, the elders were Black, the teaching was Black, and they focused only on Blacks as their audience. But other races were accepted when they had also been brought into the Hoodoo community and learned the tradition. Even so, we should still acknowledge that Hoodoo, Conjure, or Rootwork is not ours but only belongs to the Black community. We are just believers who are grafted into their rich yet humble tradition and, by word and deed, embrace genuine African-American folk spirituality and magic. This is all we can do for all the blessings we received from God and our Black ancestors.

Hoodoo's lack of religious structure and hierarchical authority do not mean that any person or group can appropriate or redefine it. If one cannot respect Hoodoo as it is and for what it is, then please, do not play with it.

Learn, How Conjure Is Worked On

Authentic Conjure is not all about blending and selling oils and casting spells online to make money. Hoodoo has its own spiritual philosophy, theology, and a wide range of African-American folkways, customs, and practices which include, but are not limited to, veneration of the ancestors, Holy Ghost shouting, snake reverence, spirit possession, graveyard conjure, nkisi practices, Black hermeneutics, African-American church traditions, the ring shout, the Kongo cosmogram, ritual water immersions, crossroads magic, making conjure canes, animal sacrifices, Jewish scriptural magic, enemy works, Seekin' ritual, magical incorporation of bodily fluids, etc.

Unfortunately, they are currently missing in marketeered or commercial Hoodoo, as they are being removed, disregarded, or ignored by unknowing merchants who simply want to profit from an African-American spiritual tradition, thus reducing Hoodoo to just a plethora of recipes, spells, and tricks.

Tim and I are completely aware that we are not African-Americans, so we are doing our best to retain and preserve the customs and traditions of the slave ancestors to avoid unnecessary conflict with the larger Black-Belt Hoodoo community and prevent them from labeling us inauthentic outsiders and our practice as mere 'cultural misappropriation.'

Accept, Who We Are

The byproduct of eons of slave history, Black supremacists believe that only people with African or African-American blood are real Hoodoo practitioners and are often inclined to consider themselves as the elite of the Hoodoo community; a place in which they believed that Whites, Latinos, Asians or any other races who do not have Black ancestry do not belong. Black supremacists are prone to be very hostile towards both “outsiders” and those accepting of them, fearing that their promotion and acceptance would dilute or even negate the Black identity of Hoodoo.

Although we do understand why some Blacks hold this stance, since a lot of people nowadays are misappropriating many aspects of Hoodoo and teaching the spiritual path even without proper education and training (for purely monetary purposes), we would, however, want to say that not all non-Black Hoodoo practitioners are the same.

WE respect what Hoodoo is, and we never try to change it, claim it as our own, disregard its history, take unfair advantage of it, speak against the people who preserve it, and mix it with other cultures (like our own) and call it Filipino/Pinoy Hoodoo, Gypsy Hoodoo or Wiccan Hoodoo because there are no such things.