For general healing, write the names of the blessed family (Jesus, Mary, Joseph) on a piece of paper. Take a candle from a church and drip the wax on the paper while praying for the hand of Christ to be on the person needing healing. Fold the paper toward you and bind with a red string in the name of the Trinity. Carry it as close to the skin as possible.
To protect from disease, wear a copper bracelet or ring.
Fix a penny heads up to the bottom of a white taper candle and anoint it with blessed olive oil. If the person needing healing is present, place the tip in their navel and pray for the disease to be drawn out and into the candle. Hold the candle over their left shoulder and light it. Set it up on a plate covered with âsilver paperâ (foil) and let it burn down. When the candle has melted completely, have the person spit onto the wax, wrap it in the silver paper, and either bury it at the roots of a tree or in the corner of a crossroads.
For burns, pass your hand over the burn, going away from the person or away from their heart. With each pass, say, âThree ladies came from the east, one with fire and two with frost. Out with the fire in with the frost! In the name of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.â Do this three times. Afterward, you and the person shouldn't light, make, or tend any fires until the next sunset passes. This includes cooking over a stove or using a lighter.
Carry a walnut for rheumatism or arthritisâbegin carrying it while it is still small and green. Once it is completely black and dry, toss it and replace it.
Place their photo in the Bible facing Psalm 23 and pray over it. Leave it there for three days, then take it out and put it in a jar of clear water. Add dirt from a hospital or mountaintop, a tablespoon of lard, a pinch of tobacco, and a pinch of salt while praying for their well-being and health, calling on God and the ancestors to âwash their name,â a term I heard Papaw use once when healing. Swirl the contents of the jar clockwise as the hand of the clock goes up to build up their strength and health, while still praying. Work this jar every Sunday until they are better. Once they are, drain the water at a crossroads and keep the strained contents; give these to the person in a bundle to hide in their home above their head. As long as it's there and stays dry, it'll keep their health up.
For breathing issues, wear a âgreened pennyâone that has oxidized, with a hole made through the chest of Abe.
Pass a white candle over yourself or another from head to toe three times while saying the Lord's Prayer. Set the candle down and let it burn completely. Spit on the remains and bury it at a crossroads.
Add to a bath of water 1 cup new blessed salt, 3 tablespoons white vinegar, and ½ cup hyssop. Take the bath before sunrise, washing downward only, while reciting Psalm 51:7. End the bath at sunrise and take a portion of the bathwater outside and cast the water toward the rising sun. To make blessed salt, simply pronounce the Lord's Prayer over it three times at sunrise, noon, and sunset. Do this for three consecutive days. The same is done with sweet oil for anointing. You can switch out ingredients with any of the following: a cap of tar water, a cap of ammonia, a strong cup of brewed coffee, a tablespoon of baking soda, or mud from a river after it has flooded (to further wash away your âdebrisâ)âjust make sure to use an odd number of ingredients.
Cut a lemon in half while holding two pennies (minted in the year of your birth) under your upper lip. Sprinkle a pinch of salt on each half, making an X, and insert the pennies in the center of each. Place the lemon under your bed to sleep over for three days, namely Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. Remove the lemon and bury it off property on Saturday.
To remove conjugation or ill luck, wash your current change of clothes with salt and vinegar and then burn them. Take the ashes to a crossroads at midnight and scatter them when the wind blows.
For protection during travel, carry a rabbit's foot or a jack containing nine yarrow leaves, three pennies, and dust from the home.
To protect from the evil eye, get some red yarn and go to the oldest grave in a cemetery. Walk counterclockwise around it seven times while wrapping the yarn around your left wrist once for every turn while praying Psalm 23. You can also wear gold or silver, or embroider an X in the leftleg hem of your underwear. Don't forget to leave an offering for the grave in return for you doing the work there.
To protect from being conjured, carry in a sack a horseshoe nail, ground ivy root, and blessed salt. You can also sprinkle a mixture of salt, black pepper, and red pepper in your shoes or wear a silver dime on your right ankle.
To protect from illness, wear a bag of asafoetida, salt, and a copper penny.
Wear a rosary, cross, or other religious symbol.
To guard against roaming ghosts and other haints, my family would always get five sticks and bind them in such a way as to make a five-pointed star, called a âwitch's markâ in Appalachia. You can still see these stars hung on the sides of homes and barns everywhere.
Take a silver spoon and gather dirt from the grave of a baby (because they've never been convicted of anything) and leave nine pennies behind in its place. Mix the dirt with sugar, cinnamon, and flour. Make a packet of brown paper with your name written on it and the name of the courthouse below that. Mark out all consonants so both resonate with their vowels. Carry the packet in your left shoe to keep the judge on your side.
To keep the law away, make a sachet with an Indian-head penny, tobacco, and moss from the foundation of a church. Bless it following the method given previously to keep all law enforcement far from you.
Carry items for good luck when going to court, such as a peep-stone, four-leaf clover, etc. You can also sprinkle new salt in your shoes to make you âslicker than glassâ so you'll get by just fine. According to my mother, you should also take a toothbrush and a change of solid white clothes. This prevents you from going to jail because you're already prepared.
Take two pieces of paper and write each person's name on them with their date of birth. Bind them together with red string and dust it with a mixture of powdered rose petals, flour, and sugar. Bury the bundle on the east side of a tree, preferably a willow, to bring them together.
To keep a lover from running around, make a sachet of mayapple root, rose petals, and bloodroot. Include some connection to them: dirty garments, hair, nails, or a photo. Bind it with a red string. Bless the sachet and bury it under the doorstep. Every time the lover walks over it, it'll keep them faithful. To âfeedâ the work, water it with your first morning urine once a month while calling their name out three times and telling them to stay as the River Jordan did.
For new love, give them wine or whiskey in which you've soaked your toenails for three days, from Wednesday to Friday. Strain it on Saturday morning. This will win over anyone.
To have a lover return, whisper their name when you wake up and when you go to bed for nine days. On the tenth day, cast three handfuls of salt into the fireplace and recite the following for each: âI charm you on your breast and sides, as the colt follows the mare; as the rain seeks the earth; seek and find me. By the voice that called the Virgin, I call you back to me.â
To have one fall in love with you, take a cloth, shirt, or other garment for them to wear. Wet it with your first morning's urine for three days. Then find two coupling animals (rooting snakes, mating dogs, etc.) and cover them with the cloth and then take it back. Give it to your lover to wear. Of course you can mask any possible smell with your preferred cologne or perfume.
To incite passion in a relationship, hide a turkey bone wrapped and tied in their unwashed garments under the bed. Take a âstray hairâ from their head and one from your own; bundle them in a bag with honeysuckle blooms, sugar, and ground hard candy; hang this on the bedpost.
For sports, take a dish that was broken by accident and make three cuts on the chest and four on the back. Powder some dandelion root really fine and rub into the cuts. This is supposed to âtoughen upâ the person and bring success.
Bake the tip of a cow tongue. Take it to seven cemeteries and touch it to the oldest headstone in each yard, leaving a dime for each grave. Place the tongue in your mouth over your own and say your prayers for success in money or gambling. Carry in the left pocket.
On a full moon, take the left hind foot of a white rabbit to the oldest grave at midnight. At the headstone, pour some moonshine for the spirit of the grave, telling them to help you witch the foot under the eyes of the Trinity. Dip the toes of the foot in the same moonshine and trace the engraved dates on the headstone with the toes while saying, âAs many days are here inscribed, the same for me will be lucky and safe.â Do this three times, then leave the rest of the moonshine and exit the graveyard following the precautions spoken of before.
To get someone to leave town or move away from your area, take a splinter of lightning-struck wood and place it under their porch steps or where they'll walk over it.
Alternatively, take dirt from their footstep or where they recently walked and fold it up in a brown paper bag. Dunk it in water and then burn it while saying, âWater and fire are at your feet. By the voice that chased Adam from the garden, get gone.â Repeat until it is ashes. Take those ashes and mix them with dirt from their yard and sprinkle it where they'll walk. To sprinkle it, walk backward an odd number of steps while saying their name and repeating the above.
Powder some dead spiders and mix with black pepper and salt. Sprinkle this in an X formation where the person will walk over it.
Take a spool of handspun yarn and pierce it with thirteen needles. Relieve yourself on it while saying the person's name and telling them to leave. Bury this where they will walk over it.
To stop gossip, take a photo of the person responsible and cut out their eyes so they cannot âgive the eyeâ and cut out the mouth so they cannot âspeak the eye.â Place this in a mason jar and piss on it while calling their name, praying for their tongue to draw, for salt and vinegar to be in their mouth. Add nine pins and needles. Every day for nine days, tap the top with a silver spoon while praying your petition. On the tenth day, bury the jar in a churchyard or cemetery.
An old trick for this is to âcatch their voiceâ: get a string and begin to tie a knot in it. Call for them when you're around them, and when they answer, without them knowing, pull the knot tight. The more knots you can get before they come, the stronger the spell will be. Take the cord and place it in a bottle filled with vinegar, alum, red dust, and your first morning urine. Shake the bottle while praying for them to stop.
For Success/To Turn Your Luck Around
Catch your first urine in the morning in a jar and add a handful of salt to the liquid. Take it and walk nine steps out and away from your home. At the ninth step, stop and recite the Lord's Prayer, following it with a prayer for your luck to turn around and for all ill fortune to be chased off by the Holy Trinity. Take a step backward toward the house and do the same. Do so for each step, counting nine in reverse. At the doorstep, turn toward the house and wash the doorstep with the  mixture in the jar and without looking back, go back inside and think nothing more of it.
Sprinkle new salt in your shoes and you'll be âslicker than a slugâ or âslicker than glassâ in everything you set out to do.
Wave your hand over the burn going away from the person while reciting, âTwo angels came and sat on a stone; one with fire and one with frost. Go away fire, come in frost! In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.â Recite it three times, passing the hand for each, followed by a breath blown on the burn directed away from the person.
Light a candle used during a wake or funeral and set it on the burn. Turn a clear glass over it to encompass the candle. When the flame goes out, fill the glass with water and pour this over the burn. What harmed you can cure you.
Wash the place with well water, stumpwater, or rainwater from Easter Sunday.
Wrap the limb with a strip of eel skin while saying the Lord's Prayer and a Hail Mary.
Mama always said, âfeed a cold, starve a fever.â Don't eat anything once the fever comes on. Wipe yourself down with an ice-cold washcloth while reciting the Lord's Prayer three times. Once the cloth is no longer cold, wring the water into a bowl and throw the cloth into the freezer. Place the bowl under the bed or couch and lay over it until the fever breaks.
Wear dirt collected from a church on St. John's Day in a bag about the neck.
Make a sachet containing three lamb's ears leaves, nine blackberry leaves harvested before September 29, and blessed salt. Sleep with this around the neck or under the pillow.
Sleep with a rabbit's left hind foot under the mattress.
Sleep under an authentic dream catcher, but never touch the feathers or the charm will be ineffective.
For bed wetting, as previously mentioned, give a tea made from corn silk. Sweeten to taste.
Place a Bible beneath the bed while saying, âIn the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, as the waters of Jordan stood so shall the waters of [name].â
For sleepwalking, place a Bible at the head of the bed and a bucket of water at the foot.
Alternatively, take one of the person's shirts and tie a knot in it. Place it lengthwise on the foot of the bed at their feet so they will stay sleeping.
For sore hands or feet, soak them in vinegar, salt, and warm water for thirty minutes.
Let a dog lick the sores or wounds and they'll be healed in three days, as they were for Lazarus in the Bible.
Rub the wound good with salt and honey and then wash it in warm water.
Carry the boiled and dried tip of a cow's tongue around the neck.
Drink water from a cobalt blue glass.
Chew the grass that grows on a newly dug grave on a Sunday.
Wear a deer, hog, or buffalo tooth around the neck.
Take the jawbone of a donkey and walk backward nine steps, then drop the bone there and leave it. This is preferably done somewhere you'll never see the bone again.â
â11 â Pray the Devil Down: Folk Recipes and Remediesâ
Conjure & Folk Magic from Appalachia
