Also called luck hand, lucky mojo, luck bag, toby
A small flannel bag holding an odd number of lucky roots, herbs and tokens, tied shut, 'fed' with oil or spirits and carried out of sight. It is the classic Hoodoo way to carry good luck.
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Take care: Nutmeg is toxic in large amounts; this is for carrying, not eating. Hoodoo is a living tradition rooted in Black American history; learn from Black practitioners and credit the tradition.
Card players and dice shooters carried lucky hand root, a hand-shaped orchid tuber, with five-finger grass and a pair of miniature dice in red flannel, rubbing it before play.
Uses: lucky hand root, five-finger grass, miniature dice
A green flannel bag with a lodestone, a silver dime and money-drawing herbs, kept in a wallet or cash register for steady income.
Uses: lodestone, silver dime, green flannel
In New Orleans a similar charm bag is called a gris-gris, a word that came to Louisiana from West Africa. Its contents and blessing vary by worker and purpose.
The mojo bag is the staple amulet of Hoodoo, the African American magical tradition of the South. The word's origin is uncertain; suggestions include a West African word for prayer, a Kongo term, or a corruption of 'magic'. Its form, a bundle of potent things bound in cloth and kept alive by feeding, closely matches West and Central African charm bundles such as Kongo minkisi, which enslaved people carried into American practice.
In the 1930s Harry Middleton Hyatt interviewed hundreds of Southern rootworkers and recorded many mojo recipes, later published as Hoodoo, Conjuration, Witchcraft, Rootwork (1970 to 1978). Older bags often held animal parts such as rabbit feet or teeth. Today many workers, including the Lucky Mojo Curio Company, offer herb-and-root versions. The bag in this entry uses only plants and coins.
A white clover stem that grew four leaflets instead of three, kept as a charm for good luck. In older British and Irish lore it also let the finder see through fairy glamour.
A small flannel bag holding a lodestone fed with magnetic sand and a John the Conqueror root, carried to draw money, work and luck. It is a classic charm of African American Hoodoo.
Folk ways gamblers have tried to catch luck: a hand-shaped root carried in a bag, and dream books that turn what you dreamed into numbers to play. This entry covers the history and a modest, safe ritual.
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