48 Fun Facts About Voodoo

Haitian Vodou developed on which island?

Hispaniola: in French Saint-Domingue, on the island's western third, enslaved Africans had to be baptised by law, and many are thought to have kept serving their own spirits behind the images of Catholic saints.

In Haitian Vodou, what is the supreme creator god called?

Bondye, from the French Bon Dieu ('Good God'), is named daily in the phrase 'if God wills' but is thought too remote to ask for help, so everyday troubles are taken to the spirits who act as his go-betweens.

Most of Haitian Vodou's songs and prayers are performed in which language?

Creole, the everyday language of most Haitians, carries nearly all of the liturgy; a few songs keep fragments of West African languages, and a 'bush priest' may add Catholic prayers in French or Latin.

The word Vodou is usually traced to a word for 'spirit' in which West African language?

Fon, the language of old Dahomey, has vodún for a spirit or deity, as does its close relative Ewe; outsiders made it the religion's name, while Haitians traditionally say only that they 'serve the spirits'.

Which Haitian dictator, a physician by training, built Vodou into his own personality cult?

François Duvalier, 'Papa Doc', studied Vodou as a young ethnologist; in power from 1957, he wove it into his personality cult and courted its priests, turning the faith into a tool of his rule.

Which lwa is saluted first in Rada ceremonies, as the guardian of gates and crossroads?

Papa Legba is saluted first because he is believed to open the way for every other spirit: until he does, none of them can join the ceremony. He is pictured as a feeble old man leaning on a crutch.

Which Catholic saint is the crossroads lwa most often syncretized with in Haitian Vodou?

Saint Peter, pictured holding the keys of heaven, was the natural match for the spirit who opens the way to all the others; worshippers in New Orleans Voodoo made the same pairing.

Who heads the Gede family of death spirits?

Baron Samedi leads the Gede, who for all their ties to death are the clowns of a ceremony: they turn up cracking crude jokes and mocking officials, soldiers and anyone who puts on airs.

How is the chief of the Gede usually depicted?

In a top hat and dark glasses, with a black tail coat, the chief of the Gede is dressed for a funeral; most Haitian cemeteries keep a cross in his name, where visitors leave candles and food.

Which James Bond film features a henchman who takes the name of the Gede's chief?

Live and Let Die (1973), Roger Moore's first Bond film, cast the dancer Geoffrey Holder as the laughing henchman, who seems to be killed yet is seen riding the front of Bond's train in the final shot.

Which serpent lwa is depicted with his consort as two intertwined snakes?

Danbala and his consort Ayida-Weddo are drawn as two intertwined snakes, and he behaves like one: worshippers he possesses slither across the floor and flick out their tongues, hissing instead of speaking.

Which Catholic saint is the serpent lwa most often equated with in Haitian Vodou?

Saint Patrick is shown in the popular prints with snakes at his feet, which made him the natural face for the serpent lwa, honoured on 17 March; Moses, whose staff became a serpent, is the other match.

What is Èzili Freda the lwa of?

Love and luxury are Èzili Freda's realm and a heart is her emblem, yet the Catholic image paired with this spirit of pleasure is the sorrowing Mater Dolorosa, Our Lady of Sorrows.

Which twin saints are the Marasa, the sacred twins, equated with?

Cosmas and Damian, twin brothers and physicians in Catholic legend, stand for the Marasa, who rank so high that a ceremony greets them before almost every other spirit.

What is a Vodou temple called?

Ounfò (also hounfour) is the Vodou temple; the religion has no central authority, so each one is independent, run by its own priest or priestess and free to keep its own customs.

What are the titles for a Vodou priest and priestess?

Oungan and manbo spend much of their time as healers: clients bring troubles of love, health or work, and the priest or priestess uses divination to find the cause and prescribe a remedy.

What are vèvè?

Symbolic floor drawings made in cornmeal or ash, vèvè each belong to one spirit: tracing the emblem is meant to draw that spirit down, and the food offered to it is then laid on the design.

What is the ason?

A sacred rattle used to summon the lwa, the ason is a beaded gourd and the badge of the priesthood: becoming a priest or priestess is spoken of as 'taking the ason'.

What is a person possessed by a lwa during a ceremony called?

A chwal, or horse: the spirit is said to mount and ride the dancer, speaking and acting through the body, and afterwards the 'horse' is believed to remember nothing of it.

Where do Vodouists believe the spirit dwells for a year and a day after death?

The land of the Ginen is the spirits' ancestral Africa, pictured as a realm beneath the waters; only when a year and a day have passed can the family hold the rite that calls the dead back out of the water.

According to Haitian legend, a Vodou ceremony at which site sparked the Revolution in 1791?

Bois Caïman, a wood near Cap-Français, is where legend has slaves from nearby plantations meet in August 1791, sacrifice a black pig and swear in its blood to revolt; the rising began a week later.

Who is said to have presided over the Vodou ceremony that launched Haiti's 1791 slave uprising?

Dutty Boukman is said to have led the rite and given the signal for the revolt, while the priestess Cécile Fatiman made the sacrifice; tradition remembers him as a Vodou priest.

Which Haitian president granted Vodou official recognition in 2003?

Jean-Bertrand Aristide, himself a former Catholic priest, recognised Vodou as a religion in April 2003, so that baptisms and marriages performed by its priests became legally valid.

What was Operation Nettoyage, launched by Haiti's government in 1941?

A Church-backed drive to destroy temples: in 1941 government forces helped Catholic clergy wreck Vodou sanctuaries in an 'anti-superstition campaign', which like earlier ones failed to break the religion.

In Haitian folklore, what is a zombie raised from the grave to do?

Labour in the fields: unlike Hollywood's flesh-eater, the Haitian zombie is a corpse with no will of its own, kept as a sorcerer's slave on a farm or sugar plantation, and often read as an image of slavery outlasting death.

Which Harvard ethnobotanist argued in the 1980s that Haitian 'zombie powder' was a real drug?

Wade Davis built The Serpent and the Rainbow (1985) on Clairvius Narcisse, pronounced dead in 1962 and found alive in 1980, and argued that zombification was a punishment imposed by secret societies.

Which animal's poison was claimed in the 1980s to be the key ingredient of Haitian zombie powder?

Pufferfish carry tetrodotoxin, said to drop victims into a deathlike trance before burial; the theory proved controversial, as chemists who tested the powders found too little of the toxin to do it.

Which film, inspired by William Seabrook's The Magic Island, was the first feature-length zombie movie?

White Zombie (1932) cast Bela Lugosi as a Voodoo master in Haiti who turns a young woman into a zombie; it opened three years after Seabrook's book brought the zombie of Haitian folklore to English-speaking readers.

What role does the pin-stuck 'voodoo doll' play in Haitian Vodou and Louisiana Voodoo?

Hardly any in either: the pin-stuck doll is not prominent in Haiti or in New Orleans, and its link with the religion was forged by popular books and horror films of the early 20th century.

Which New Orleans pianist took his stage name from a 19th-century Voodoo conjurer said to be a Senegalese prince?

Dr. John was the persona Mac Rebennack built in the 1960s on a real conjurer of old New Orleans who sold herbal cures; his theatrical stage shows borrowed freely from Voodoo ceremonies.

Who brought Vodou from Saint-Domingue to Louisiana in the early 19th century?

Refugees fleeing the Revolution there, planters and the people they enslaved among them, settled mainly in New Orleans in their thousands, and the Vodou they carried fed into Louisiana's own Voodoo.

Which Disney film set in New Orleans has a Voodoo villain, Dr. Facilier, and a Voodoo helper, Mama Odie?

The Princess and the Frog (2009) puts Voodoo on both sides: Dr. Facilier uses a talisman to turn Prince Naveen into a frog, while Mama Odie, deep in the bayou, tells the heroes how the spell can be broken.

What was the day job of Marie Laveau, the Voodoo Queen of New Orleans?

Hairdresser by trade, Marie Laveau also prepared herbal remedies and charms, and people came to her for help with their marriages, lawsuits, money and health.

On the shore of which lake did Marie Laveau lead her major Voodoo ceremonies?

Lake Pontchartrain, on the northern edge of New Orleans, hosted the big ceremonies with singing, drumming and dancing; curious outsiders crept up to watch, and newspapers ran lurid accounts of what they saw.

Where in New Orleans is Marie Laveau, the Voodoo Queen, generally believed to be buried?

Saint Louis Cemetery No. 1 holds the Glapion family tomb where she is believed to lie; visitors mark Xs on it to ask her for a wish, and since 2015 tourists have been let in only with a guide.

What are the charms made in Louisiana Voodoo for healing or cursing called?

Gris-gris, charms made to help or to harm, were often a small pouch of ingredients worn around the neck; Marie Laveau mixed them for clients who came to her about love, lawsuits, money and luck.

On which night were the biggest Louisiana Voodoo gatherings held?

Saint John's Eve, 23-24 June, brought the biggest gatherings, held by the water with feasting and dancing; by the 1870s they drew crowds of sightseers and newspaper reporters as well as worshippers.

Which animal featured in New Orleans Voodoo ceremonies as the embodiment of the deity Grand Zombi?

A live snake stood for the Grand Zombi in New Orleans ceremonies; Marie Laveau was described as communing with one, though the story that she kept a pet snake named Zombi cannot be confirmed.

Which practice carried on elements of Louisiana Voodoo as the organised religion declined?

Hoodoo kept the charms and spells but dropped the priestesses and communal worship: its 'doctors' worked from homes and shops, selling clients powders, oils and incense.

Vodun's main oracle, Fá, was adopted from which people's Ifá?

The Yoruba originated Ifá, and their neighbours took it up under the name Fá: in both, a trained diviner casts sacred palm nuts or a divining chain and reads the answer from the pattern that falls.

Which West African country made 10 January its national Vodun holiday in the 1990s?

Benin created the holiday once its new democratic government had lifted the anti-Vodun laws of the Marxist years; the main celebrations are held each year in the coastal town of Ouidah.

Which Vodun spirit, a seductress who brings wealth, is famous along the coast of West Africa?

Mami Wata owes her best-known face to a circus: a 19th-century German print of a snake charmer was copied so widely along the coast that it became the usual image of the spirit.

Which Cuban and Brazilian religions are often described as sister religions of Haitian Vodou?

Santería and Candomblé are called Vodou's sisters because all three grew the same way: from West African faiths carried across the Atlantic by enslaved people, who matched their old gods to Catholic saints.

What is the central post of a Vodou temple, through which the lwa are said to enter?

The poto mitan, the central post of the peristil, is the channel through which the lwa are said to enter; offerings, vèvè and sacrifices are made around it.

Which lwa of crops and agriculture is usually addressed as 'Papa' or 'Cousin'?

Azaka, known as Cousin Zaka, is pictured as a peasant farmer and protector of country people: those he possesses put on a straw hat, smoke a clay pipe and speak with a rustic accent.

Around which Catholic feast do Haitians hold their great festival for the Gede?

All Souls' Day, 2 November: with All Saints' Day before it, Haitians crowd the cemeteries of Port-au-Prince to honour the Gede, many of them dressed in the spirits' colours of black and purple.

In Vodou each person has a guardian lwa called the mèt tèt, a name that means 'master of' what?

The head is where a spirit is believed to enter and settle, so the lwa who shapes a person's character is 'master of the head', and initiation includes washing the head to make it ready.

Whose reported apparition in the 19th century made the Haitian waterfall of Saut d'Eau a place of pilgrimage?

The Virgin Mary, whom Vodouists identify with the lwa Èzili, is said to have appeared there; every July thousands of pilgrims come to bathe beneath the falls, honouring the Virgin and the spirit at once.