Rites
87 rites, charms and ceremonies, each told in outline as a custom: a ring of what goes into it, coloured by role, and a drawn frame for every step. Cleanse, gather, circle, speak, light, offer, bind, bury, cast, read, rest, close.
Presented by ClearTrust Customs described as customs, free to read.
Protective rites
Rites that ward a person, house or journey: thresholds, salt, red thread, blessings against the evil eye.
🇮🇳 🇵🇰 🇳🇵 Protective ritesNimbu-mirchi and nazar utarnaThe lemon and green chillies on a thread over a shop door, and the wave of chillies and salt that takes off the evil eye.🇮🇳 🇵🇰 🇧🇩 Protective ritesThe kajal dot on a childA small black mark of kohl on the cheek, brow or foot, said to turn the evil eye away from a baby.🇮🇳 🇱🇰 Protective ritesKolam at the thresholdThe rice-flour pattern drawn at the door each dawn, said to welcome prosperity and to feed small creatures.🇨🇳 🇹🇼 🇭🇰 Protective ritesWriting and burning a fu talismanThe Taoist talisman written in red or black ink on paper, then pasted, worn, or burned to send its message.🇯🇵 Protective ritesOmamori and ofuda renewalThe yearly return of last year's charms to the shrine, and the taking of new ones for the home and the body.🇮🇷 🇦🇫 🇹🇯 Protective ritesEsfand, the wild rue smokeSeeds of wild rue crackle on hot coals and the smoke is carried around a person, said to turn the evil eye away.🇹🇷 🇬🇷 🇨🇾 Protective ritesThe nazar boncuğu, the blue beadThe blue glass eye hung on babies, doors and cars, believed to take on the harm of an envious look.🇮🇱 🇵🇸 🇺🇸 Protective ritesThe red thread and Rachel's tombA red wool thread, wound around the tomb of Rachel and tied on the left wrist, worn against the evil eye.🇮🇱 🇲🇦 🇮🇶 Protective ritesWriting a Jewish amulet (kame'a)A written amulet of psalms and names on parchment, made by a scribe for a mother, a newborn or a house.🇲🇦 🇩🇿 🇹🇳 Protective ritesAmazigh protective tattoosThe dots, lines and crosses once tattooed on the faces and hands of Amazigh women, said to protect and to mark belonging.🇪🇹 🇪🇷 Protective ritesDebtera amulet scrollsEthiopian Orthodox lay specialists who write protective prayers on parchment scrolls for clients.🇮🇹 🇩🇪 🇫🇷 Protective ritesThe Sator squareA Latin word square that reads the same in every direction, used as an amulet in medieval and early modern Europe.🇮🇸 Protective ritesIcelandic galdrastafirMagical staves from Icelandic grimoires, drawn or carved for protection, luck and legal success.🇺🇸 Protective ritesHoodoo mojo bagA small cloth bag carried for luck or protection, central to African American conjure and hoodoo.🇺🇸 🇬🇧 🇨🇦 Protective ritesCasting a Wiccan circleThe opening act of a Wiccan ritual, in which a space is marked and the four quarters are called.
Cleansing and purification
Smoke, water, sweeping and fire used to clear a person or place: limpia, smudging customs, lustration.
🇲🇾 🇮🇩 🇧🇳 Cleansing and purificationMandi bunga, the Malay flower bathA cleansing bath in water with flowers and limes, taken to remove ill luck, with a bomoh or at home.🇯🇵 Cleansing and purificationHarai, the Shinto rite of purificationThe wand, water and salt rites of Shinto that clear tsumi, impurity, from people and places.🇲🇦 🇩🇿 🇹🇳 Cleansing and purificationBkhour, the Moroccan fumigationIncense burned on charcoal at the threshold, after a birth and before a guest, to scent and, it is said, to clear.🇮🇱 🇺🇸 Cleansing and purificationKapparotThe custom before Yom Kippur of passing a fowl or money round the head as a symbolic substitute.🇺🇸 Cleansing and purificationHoodoo floor washingThe Southern custom of washing floors and doorsteps with prepared water, said to clear a home of bad influence.🇨🇦 🇺🇸 Cleansing and purificationSmudging, and who may do itBurning sage, sweetgrass or cedar to cleanse a person or place. Many Indigenous nations hold this as sacred, and non-Indigenous use is debated.🇲🇽 🇺🇸 🇬🇹 Cleansing and purificationLimpia with an eggA cleansing in which a healer passes an egg, herbs or both over a person, said to take away fright, envy or the evil eye.🇳🇿 Cleansing and purificationKarakia and lifting tapuThe Maori chant that opens and closes a task, and the rites that make a tapu place or person safe to approach again.🇦🇺 Cleansing and purificationAboriginal smoking ceremonyA public welcome in which native leaves are burned and the smoke is believed to cleanse a place and its visitors. Other ceremonies are closed.
Rites of divination
Set ways of asking and reading the answer: casting, drawing, scrying, and the sessions of diviners.
🇭🇰 🇹🇼 🇨🇳 Rites of divinationKau cim and jiaobeiShaking numbered sticks from a cylinder in a temple, and tossing two crescent blocks to ask a question.🇨🇳 🇹🇼 🇰🇷 Rites of divinationThe I Ching and the yarrow stalksThe older way of consulting the Book of Changes: sorting fifty yarrow stalks to build a hexagram of six lines.🇯🇵 Rites of divinationOmikuji fortune slipsA paper fortune drawn at a shrine or temple, kept if it is good and tied to a branch if it is not.🇳🇬 🇧🇯 🇹🇬 Rites of divinationIfa divinationThe Yoruba system in which a babalawo reads a sacred verse from a cast of palm nuts or an opele chain.🇮🇪 🇬🇧 Rites of divinationSamhain and Halloween divination gamesGames of foretelling played on the last night of October, with apples, nuts and a ring in a cake.🇺🇸 🇬🇧 Rites of divinationThe Ouija boardA lettered board with a planchette, patented in 1890 in America, used to ask questions of spirits.🇫🇷 🇮🇹 🇺🇸 Rites of divinationA tarot readingA reading in which a seated reader lays cards and interprets them for a question, from Italian card games to modern spreads.
Healing rites
Rites of folk and spiritual healing, said as tradition and never as medical advice.
🇵🇭 Healing ritesAlbularyo healingThe visit to a Filipino folk healer, who reads wax or alum in water and prays over an ill person.🇪🇬 Healing ritesHeka, Egyptian ritual powerThe Egyptian art of heka, in which spoken spells, acts and amulets work together, shown in the medical and magical papyri.🇵🇹 🇧🇷 Healing ritesBenzedeira blessingPortuguese blessing by a benzedeira, a woman who prays over a person with a sprig of rue or a cross.🇷🇺 🇺🇦 🇧🇾 Healing ritesZagovor, the spoken charmRussian and Slavic spoken charms, recited over water, thread or a person, and often joined to Orthodox prayer.🇺🇸 Healing ritesPennsylvania German powwowBraucherei, the Pennsylvania German folk healing of prayers, signs and written charms. It is unrelated to Native American powwows.🇺🇸 Healing ritesAppalachian charm for stopping bloodA Scripture verse said by a charmer to stop bleeding, one of the best recorded folk charms of the American South.🇺🇸 Healing ritesNavajo sandpaintingDiné ceremonial paintings of coloured sand made for a healing way. The sacred ones are destroyed after use, and public art versions are made differently.🇲🇽 🇵🇪 🇺🇸 Healing ritesA curanderismo healing sessionA visit to a curandero or curandera, who talks, prays and cleanses, and may suggest herbs or a limpia.🇺🇸 Healing ritesHooponoponoThe Hawaiian practice of setting things right within a family, led by an elder, through talk, prayer, and forgiveness.
Luck and love
Rites for fortune, a good match, fertility and a prosperous year.
🇨🇳 🇭🇰 🇹🇼 Luck and loveFeng shui placementThe arrangement of a house, a grave or an office so that the flow of qi is believed to gather and not scatter.🇲🇦 🇩🇿 🇹🇳 Luck and loveHenna nightThe women's evening before a wedding when the bride's hands and feet are painted with henna and blessed.🇬🇧 Luck and loveFirst-footing at HogmanayThe Scottish and northern English custom that the first person to cross the threshold after midnight shapes the luck of the year.🇬🇧 🇮🇪 🇩🇪 Luck and loveKnocking on wood and horseshoe customsSmall habits of luck: touching wood after a hopeful remark, and nailing a horseshoe over a door.
Offerings and feeding the unseen
Food, drink and gifts set out for ancestors, spirits, gods and the land.
🇹🇭 🇱🇦 🇰🇭 Offerings and feeding the unseenSpirit house offeringsThe small shrine at the edge of a Thai plot where food, flowers and drink are set out for the spirit of the place.🇮🇩 Offerings and feeding the unseenCanang sari and the daily offeringThe small palm-leaf tray of flowers and incense that Balinese Hindus set out each day for gods and for powers of the earth.🇨🇳 🇹🇼 🇭🇰 Offerings and feeding the unseenJoss paper and the Hungry Ghost offeringThe burning of paper money and goods for the dead, and the street offerings of the seventh lunar month.🇲🇳 🇷🇺 🇨🇳 Offerings and feeding the unseenWorship at an ovooCircling a cairn of stones and wood at a pass or hilltop three times and adding a stone for a safe road.🇬🇭 🇹🇬 🇳🇬 Offerings and feeding the unseenLibation to the ancestorsPouring drink to the ancestors and gods, opening ceremonies from funerals to state occasions in Ghana.🇲🇬 Offerings and feeding the unseenFamadihana, the turning of the bonesMalagasy ceremony in which family tombs are opened, the dead are rewrapped in fresh shrouds, and the family dances with them.🇧🇯 🇹🇬 🇬🇭 Offerings and feeding the unseenVodun ceremony in BeninOfferings and dance for the vodun in southern Benin, where Vodun is an official religion with its own national holiday.🇲🇽 🇬🇹 🇺🇸 Offerings and feeding the unseenDay of the Dead ofrendaThe altar built at home for the dead on 1 and 2 November, with marigolds, bread, photographs and the foods they liked.🇧🇷 Offerings and feeding the unseenCandomblé ebo offeringAn offering made in a Candomblé house of worship to feed the orixas and ask for a change in fortune.🇵🇪 🇧🇴 🇦🇷 Offerings and feeding the unseenAndean despacho and pago a la PachamamaA bundle of leaves, grains and sweets prepared for the mountains and Mother Earth, and burned or buried by a specialist.🇫🇯 🇹🇴 🇼🇸 Offerings and feeding the unseenPacific kava ceremonyA formal drinking of kava, a mildly sedating root drink, which opens chiefly meetings and welcomes guests.
Initiation and passage
Rites by which a person enters a priesthood, a society or a new stage of life.
🇮🇳 🇳🇵 🇱🇰 Initiation and passageConsecrating a yantraThe rite by which a drawn or engraved yantra is believed to be given life and made the seat of a deity.🇹🇭 🇰🇭 🇱🇦 Initiation and passageSak Yant blessingA sacred tattoo with protective script, given by a monk or lay master with vows to keep, in Thailand and Cambodia.🇪🇬 Initiation and passageThe Book of the DeadThe scroll of spells made for a dead person to carry them safely to the afterlife, and the Weighing of the Heart.🇿🇦 🇱🇸 🇸🇿 Initiation and passageSangoma calling and bone-throwingThe Zulu and Xhosa path by which a person called by the ancestors trains as a sangoma, who also reads thrown bones.🇨🇺 🇺🇸 🇵🇷 Initiation and passageSanteria initiation (kariocha)The week-long Lucumi initiation by which a person is crowned as a priest of an orisha. The details are closed to outsiders.
Counter-magic and uncrossing
Rites against curses, envy and harm: the answer to what people fear.
🇮🇳 🇳🇵 Counter-magic and uncrossingNavagraha shantiA pacifying rite to the nine planetary powers of Hindu astrology, done when a horoscope is read as difficult.🇸🇦 🇪🇬 🇲🇦 Counter-magic and uncrossingRuqyah recitationA Muslim practice of reciting Quranic verses and prayers over a person said to be touched by the evil eye, magic or a jinn.🇬🇧 🇳🇱 🇩🇪 Counter-magic and uncrossingWitch bottleA sealed jar or bottle, found hidden in English houses, said to turn a witch's harm back on its sender.🇮🇹 🇲🇹 🇺🇸 Counter-magic and uncrossingMalocchio removal with oil and waterThe Italian rite of dropping oil into water to find and lift the evil eye, often passed on at Christmas.🇬🇷 🇨🇾 Counter-magic and uncrossingMatiasma and ftou ftouThe Greek evil eye, and the little mock spit, ftou ftou, said to turn aside a compliment that might harm.🇵🇬 Counter-magic and uncrossingSorcery accusation in Papua New GuineaThe belief that a death or illness is caused by sorcery, and the violent accusations of sanguma or witchcraft that follow. A harm, not a rite to copy.
Seasonal rites
Fire, water and first-fruits customs kept at fixed points of the year.
🇮🇩 Seasonal ritesTawur KesangaThe great offering to the powers of the earth on the day before Nyepi, when Bali is cleared before a day of silence.🇯🇵 Seasonal ritesSetsubun bean-throwingOn the eve of spring, roasted beans are thrown at a masked ogre while the household calls for good luck.🇮🇷 🇦🇿 🇹🇯 Seasonal ritesChaharshanbe Suri fire-jumpingOn the last Tuesday evening of the Persian year people leap over small fires and ask the flame to take their sickliness.🇿🇦 🇿🇼 Seasonal ritesRainmaking and the Rain QueenThe Balobedu Rain Queen, Modjadji, is held to bring rain, and her reign is tied to the cycad forests of Limpopo.🇸🇪 🇵🇱 🇱🇻 Seasonal ritesMidsummer and St John's Eve herbs and firesBonfires, gathered herbs and flower crowns at the summer solstice, long tied to protection and love.🇩🇪 🇸🇪 🇫🇮 Seasonal ritesWalpurgis Night and May Day firesBonfires on the last night of April to drive away witches and welcome spring, and the May Day customs that follow.
Spirit work
Mediumship, possession, trance and journeying: rites for meeting the unseen.
🇮🇳 Spirit workTheyyamA north Kerala ritual in which a dancer, painted and crowned, is believed to become a deity before the village.🇮🇳 Spirit workBhuta KolaThe night-long Tulu spirit worship of coastal Karnataka, in which a dancer is believed to carry a guardian spirit.🇰🇷 Spirit workGut, the Korean shaman riteThe day-long ritual of a mudang, who calls gods and ancestors with music, dance, offerings and costume.🇷🇺 🇲🇳 Spirit workThe Tuvan shaman and the drumA kham, a Tuvan shaman, calls helping spirits with a drum and juniper smoke in a rite for a family or a place.🇰🇿 🇰🇬 🇺🇿 Spirit workThe Kazakh baksy and the kobyzThe baksy sings to a horsehair fiddle until trance, and speaks with ancestral spirits for a person in trouble.🇪🇬 🇸🇩 🇪🇹 Spirit workThe zar possession ceremonyA women-led healing ceremony of drum, incense and dance for people said to be troubled by a zar spirit.🇲🇦 🇩🇿 🇹🇳 Spirit workThe Gnawa lilaThe all-night Gnawa healing ceremony of music, incense and colour, in honour of the spirits called mluk.🇳🇬 🇧🇯 Spirit workEgungun masqueradeYoruba festival in which cloth-covered dancers embody the ancestors and speak to the living.🇨🇩 🇨🇬 🇦🇴 Spirit workNkisi nkondi power figuresKongo carved figures, charged by a nganga, that people held to enforce oaths and settle disputes.🇳🇬 🇬🇭 🇹🇬 Spirit workMami Wata devotionShrine rites for the water spirit Mami Wata, shown as a woman with a snake, who is said to bring wealth and ask for fidelity.🇳🇪 🇳🇬 Spirit workBori possessionHausa spirit-possession cult, with named spirits, music and a priesthood, that survives beside Islam.🇺🇸 🇬🇧 Spirit workSpiritualist seanceA sitting at which a medium is said to bring messages from the dead, a practice that began in New York State in 1848.🇭🇹 🇺🇸 Spirit workHaitian Vodou serviceA ceremony in a Vodou temple, the ounfo, with drums, song, offerings, and the arrival of the lwa in a devotee.🇵🇪 🇧🇷 🇨🇴 Spirit workAyahuasca ceremonyA night-time gathering in which a brew of the ayahuasca vine is drunk with chanting, practised by Amazonian peoples and now by visitors. It carries real risks.🇯🇲 🇹🇹 🇧🇧 Spirit workObeah in JamaicaCaribbean folk magic with African roots, banned under colonial law and still a crime or a stigma in some places.