The worship of ‘thunder-stones’ centres in Haiti—as in Africa—round old Neolithic axe-heads, still plentiful in the areas once occupied by Arawak Indians, the island’s first inhabitants. Failing these axes, stones of a particular shape are used. The supernatural properties attributed to these stones derive from their association with the loa whose power they symbolize. Hence they are called ‘Stone of Ogu’ or ‘Stone of Brisé’, whichever the case may be. On some a mirror is stuck to increase their magic powers. They must be kept in oil, otherwise they lose their powers. Their association with the loa gives them all kinds of abilities. They sweat when touched, or they whistle or talk. One of their special characteristics is the ability to go long journeys by themselves. It is not unusual for one of them to leave the altar where it lives and slip beneath the pillow or into the pocket of a ‘servant’. One Voodooist told Lorimer Denis{70} how he found a crystalline stone on his bed and at first paid no attention to it. In fact he threw it out. But the stone came back into his room. Suddenly it turned into a snake. The man chased the animal and killed it. A few days later he fell ill and so learnt that the stone and snake were none other than Damballah.
Finally the numerous pitchers (gòvi) ranged on altar tables should also be regarded as so many material symbols of loa; these receptacles are all consecrated in a special manner and after the baptism which procures them a place among the ritual objects, they are ‘dressed’ in colours which symbolize the god whom they are supposed to house. In spite of the anthropomorphic appearance which this clothing gives them, they can scarcely be likened to idols. Rather should they be classed with the jars which house the dead and with the pots de tête which hold the hairs and nailparings of the hunsi.
Among objects which derive a sacred nature from their association with loa, mention must be made of the hunsi necklaces. These are made up of china beads of various colours, alternating in groups of seven. Each loa has its representative colour—red for the Ogu, white for Damballah, blue for Ezili etc.—so that a mystic connection is to be presumed between the necklaces and the various gods. This, however, was vigorously denied by a hungan. Thinking he saw doubt and astonishment in my face, he took out his own necklace and, pointing out each colour, insisted they corresponded with loa who had no particular connection with him and that therefore aesthetic considerations alone had dictated the choice and disposition of the beads.
In Dahomey the necklaces are important cult accessories and are supposed to contain a spirit. Some vestige of this belief still lingers in Haiti: when a dignitary of the society fetches the hunsi necklaces from the sanctuary in order to serve them out, he is usually in a state of near-trance; in other words he ‘has been made tipsy by the loa’. Spectators seeing the hungan select, unhesitatingly, for each hunsi the necklace which belongs to her, conclude that his hand is guided by the gods themselves. This is not the case. Each necklace is specially marked in such a way as to prompt the memory of the priest or priestess.
VIII.—THE SACRIFICE
All faithful worshippers must help to provide the loa with food—that is why Voodoo ceremonies are often called mangers-loa. From the attitude of Voodooists and from their opinions it may be deduced that, as in Dahomey, offerings and sacrifices ‘give strength to the gods’ and the more numerous and magnificent the sacrifices, the more powerful the gods will become.
The blood sacrifice is the climax of the series of Catholic or pagan rites which make up what is called a ‘service’. Seldom are the gods approached without being offered at least a chicken. In the course of mangers-loa it is not only chickens which are immolated in great numbers but also goats and bulls and in the case of loa of the petro family, pigs. Beneath a complex exterior the Voodoo sacrifice follows the classical pattern of immolation rites. The latter tend to concentrate in an animal sacred powers which are liberated by its being put to death.
Is the person who performs the sacrifice bound to go through preliminary rites of purification, and practise certain abstentions? On this point I possess no other information than that which was supplied to Jacques Roumain{71} by the hungan Abraham in connection with the ‘sacrifice of the assoto drum’. On the eve of the ceremony the officiating priest, he tells us, must ‘take a special bath to which are added pure milk, cinnamon, star-anise, fleurs pectorales roses, jasmine and anis flowers called trois paroles. Then he must sprinkle himself with holy water and carry out a fumigation with incense and benzoin laurel. He dries himself in the open air since he must not touch himself with a towel. In addition hungan and hunsi are bound to practise strict sexual abstinence before the ceremony.’ All this preparation before sacrifice does not seem to be a general rule and, like many other details furnished by Abraham, could represent merely an ideal of conduct, seldom practised.
The choice of victim depends on precise conditions familiarity with which is part of priestly science. The animal is only acceptable to the god if it suits his tastes and if it embodies some of his own qualities. It would be tedious to list all the various preferences attributed to each spirit or group of spirits. Let us mention just a few examples: black pigs are set aside for the petro loa, guinea fowl for the Ibo, turkeys for the Kaplau-ganga, dogs for the Mondongue. As far as possible the dress or the plumage of the victim should be the loa’s own symbolical colour. Thus white animals are offered to water spirits (Damballah-wèdo, Agwé, Simbi, Clermerzine, etc.), black to the Guédé, spirits of the dead, russet or red to the Ogu. Speckled hens are kept for Brisé and some of the other petro loa.
Nothing that is concerned with sacrifice, either closely or remotely, is exempt from ritual. Indeed the very type of wood for the stake to which the victim is attached and the details of the ceremony for consecrating this stake, are all prescribed by ritual.
The consecration of the victim is carried out by degrees and continues right up to the moment of death. These steps towards sanctification we shall now describe. First comes the victim’s ceremonial bath: head, neck and feet (sometimes only the latter) are washed with a scented infusion of mombin leaves. The beast is then dried with a spotless towel, liberally perfumed and sometimes even powdered.
Bulls and goats are ‘dressed’ in a pall of silk or velvet, the colour being suitable to the loa to whom they are destined, and as a ‘head-dress’ wear a cloth tied to the base of the horns. Those who persist in regarding Voodoo as a form of sorcery read a satanic meaning in the lighted candles which are normally fixed on to the horns of goats; in fact these candles merely affirm the semi-divine nature of the victim. It is customary in Voodoo to light some kind of candle whenever you get in touch with the loa. The animal thus accoutred is croix-signé (cross-signed), that is to say marked on the back with trails of dried food (grilled maize, bits of cassava etc.) and various liquids (water, syrup, rum or coffee) spread out into crosses.
The act of killing is always preceded by a rite which is akin both to Communion and divination. The victim can only be put to death if it has first eaten some food and drunk some liquid of a sacred nature. If it refuses this, then it will be understood to have refused its death and thus, being unacceptable to the divinity, should be replaced by another victim. Chickens which undergo this test are stationed near little piles of food which have been placed on the vèvè representing the god. Their greed is further tempted by bits of maize or cassava floating in a glass of water (‘Guinea water’). When the victim is a goat or a bull, his muzzle is teased with a tuft of Guinea grass, or branch of mombin, a plant possessed of purifying powers and supposed to have come from Africa. Sometimes an attempt is also made to make the beast drink some ‘Guinea water’.
As soon as the animal has eaten or drunk, it becomes the property of the loa and partakes of his divine nature. Usually, exactly at this moment, the person who is to perform the sacrifice and often several spectators as well, become possessed by the loa to whom the animal is to be sacrificed. By appearing thus the god intimates his readiness to accept the offered victim.
The people offering the
sacrifice, having established as close a link with the god as possible, are anxious to absorb the beneficent effluvia, with which the animal is now impregnated, by establishing as close a link with it as possible. If it is a goat, they carry it in turn on their backs and dance with it. Sometimes members of the humfo society kneel, in order of rank, in front of the victim and taking it by the horns rub their foreheads against its own forehead, three times over, and then kiss the ground in front of it three times as a sign of respect. This participation in the sacred nature of the victim can be taken as a total identification of the people performing the sacrifice with the creature sacrificed. Thanks to the kindness of M. Kurt Fischer, I acquired a copy of an anonymous document which describes the sacrifice of a goat in the north of Haiti. The details are all the more interesting because they explain the bewildering scene described by W. H. Seabrook in his Magic Island. Seabrook says he witnessed a sacrifice in which a woman and a goat changed rôles, that is to say at the moment when it was being immolated the animal groaned like a human being and the woman bleated like an animal. There we have a highly romanticized version of a rite whereby the person making the sacrifice is symbolically assimilated to the victim. In the case which concerns us the sacrifice is supposed to be offered by a woman. She is led to the foot of an altar where she is greeted by an officiant who embraces her tenderly and weeps just as though she must soon die. He gives her rum to drink and the woman in sudden despair revolts against her fate. Nevertheless she kneels before the altar and her head is done up in a sort of turban just as is the goat’s. In plaintive tones she sings, ‘Kabrit marô chaché. Chimê kayli. Mwê mâdé li, sa li gêgnê. Na Giné tut mun malad. Mwê pa malad m’pralé muri.’ (The wild goat which escaped is trying to find the way home. I wonder what’s the matter. In Guinea everyone is ill. I am not ill. I am going to die.)
The goat and the woman making the sacrifice are placed in front of each other and look into each other’s eyes. The man who is to perform the sacrifice puts a leafy branch between the animal’s muzzle and the woman’s mouth which are so close together that their breath intermingles. The woman pulls the leaves away from the animal who is about to munch them; she says ‘God be praised’.
The woman kneels again in front of the altar. The priest puts his hand on her head and recites the formula: ‘In nomine Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti.’ Then he pours wine, oil and water on her hair and whitens her eyelids with flour. The woman then eats the food and drink on the altar. The goat has its throat cut and with its blood a cross is traced on the forehead of the woman and she is given three mouthfuls of it to drink.
Another means of entering into contact with the sacrificial victim is to ride it. Here is a description of what I saw last year at a petro service which took place at a settlement on the road to Kenskoff. ‘A woman staggers, hangs on to the poteau-mitan, then collapses. She lets herself fall, with arms dangling, on to the neck of a little black bull tied to the poteau-mitan. Other people possessed come up to the bull and stroke it in a loving manner. The hungan says a few Catholic prayers and goes round the victim shaking his rattle. Water from a pitcher is poured over the bull’s back and the hunsi catch it in their hands and rub it on their faces. A big girl jumps on to the back of the little bull with all the appearance of ecstasy; she rides it and shakes her shoulders in time to the rhythm of the drums. Another girl follows her and both remain, jigging up and down, on their mount. A man possessed by the loa Bakulu sits on the withers of the bull and lying along its neck, grasps its muzzle which he then sucks for some time. Then he slides along the animal and embraces it again, hanging on to its head. Next he stretches out on its back and presses his lips to its rump. Thus he remains for a few minutes, his whole body shaken by tremblings. Another person possessed lifts the bull’s tail and embraces its buttocks or anus—I don’t know which. An old peasant, likewise possessed by Bakulu, unravels the hairs on the bull’s tail and uses it on his face like a shaving brush. The hungan launches the song “Bêñê bêñê susu...” (Wash, wash, susu). Men and women crowd round the bull and rub it with their hands as though soaping it. They lead it several times round the peristyle singing at the top of their voices “Bêñê susu” and rubbing its back for all they are worth.’
This same rite when done with chickens is called passer poule (it must not be confused with ventaillage which merely consists of waving the birds in the air or crossing them in front of the body with one large, generous, sweeping movement). Contact between the victims-to-be and devotees is effected by the sacrificer, who, holding one bird by the legs in each hand, walks them in turn or at the same time, along the head, the back, the flanks and the chest of the person bowed before him.
The passer poule brings luck, but is also part of the scapegoat rite. If the officiant knows that among the faithful before him there are some who are ill, he will touch with the chickens whatever parts of their bodies are afflicted. This action suggests he intends to permeate the patient with the effluvia which earlier ceremonies have accumulated in the sacrificial victims: but since, when the operation is finished, the officiant shakes out his chickens like dusty feather-dusters, we may equally suppose he has accomplished a rite of expulsion.
This last interpretation agrees with another, which was given me by a hungan. ‘The passer-poule,’ he said, ‘takes away bad luck.’
The victim is then ‘orientated’, in other words presented to the supernatural powers of the four ‘sides’ (façades) of the universe. The sacrificer raises the fowl with a swift and sometimes even a merely sketchy movement, four times. When the animal is a goat the rite is not so simple: having stripped it of its ‘robe’ and head-dress the two assistants take it by the horns and feet and ‘swing’ it three times towards each cardinal point. After each orientation they touch the ground three times with its back, then carry it round the poteau-mitan at the double, first in one direction then in the other. Finally they run out of the peristyle and, stopping before the doors of the different ‘chapels’ they raise the victim as though to present it to the gods. Then, zigzagging across the humfo court they come quickly back under the peristyle.
Before immolating chickens it is customary first to break their wings and legs. Death is usually inflicted by pulling their heads off with a quick, twisting movement. Some sacrificers whirl the body of the bird until the head comes off in their hands. For petro loa the throat must be cut with a knife. At the moment of sacrifice the tongue or even the windpipe is often torn out with the teeth and these parts are then offered up separately. In order to realize full union between the victim and the supernatural powers, its limbs are sometimes broken against the poteau-mitan. Often, too, the officiant sucks the bird’s bleeding neck. After the sacrifice a few breast feathers are plucked and stuck on to the poteau-mitan with blood, or on to the edge of the altar or on to the rim of the sacred jars.
Just as chickens are mutilated before being put to death, so goats have their beards and testicles cut off a few moments before having their throats cut. Hair and organs are placed on the altar or on the vèvè after the priest and hunsi have sucked the testicles. The sacrificer ‘orientates’ the knife before using it and if he is painstaking he will make three feints before piercing the throat. Sometimes, too, he traces a cross with the point of his knife on the victim’s back. Very often the sacrificer is possessed by the loa to whom the animal is dedicated at the moment of immolation; in this way it is the loa himself who cuts the throat of his own victim.
Michel Leiris{72} was present at the sacrifice of a bull by a hungan in the Plaine du Cul-de-Sac. His description is so precise and detailed that I shall give an extract here:
‘The bull is brought close (till now it has been kept a few yards from the peristyle, to the right and rather to the rear); it is reddish brown, its back is covered with a pink or crimson pall and a cloth of the same colour is wrapped round its horns. It is tied to the poteau-mitan and a very old woman...comes out and dances in the centre of the peristyle. Before long she is
staggering, “tipsified” and gives vent to a few brief shrieks; she has been seized by Ogu-badagri. She goes on to perform libations with rum and syrup and spreads out bits of food on the bull’s back. She pours “Three-star Barbancourt” over his head and raising his jaws by sheer force puts the bottle into his mouth and so makes him drink: the rum trickles down the bull’s fetlock. Then the old woman, bottle in hand, puts her back against the bull’s right flank and leans backwards against him, in an attitude of triumph. She remains like this for a moment and then returns to the space between the poteau-mitan and the hunsi and has a good long drink herself from the mouth of the bottle.
‘Kissing of the earth by all hunsi positioned in a half-circle round the bull.
‘During the consecration of the bull, standard-bearers and la-place race from the peristyle to the “barrier” and return running to the peristyle.
‘The bull is freed from his finery; he is set loose and a halter is put round his neck. The low wall has two openings, one near the entrance, the other on the far side of the orchestra; it is by this latter that the bull, like the goat, was brought in, and now by the former (when it has been cleared of people) that he is quickly led out, drawn by the halter and followed by a procession including the la-place, the two hunsi standard-bearers and a number of the congregation, of which I was one.
‘The bull, which is made to run, is escorted by several men. The procession disperses over the courts in a wild rush with much fooling, laughter and general din. After a few minutes of complete confusion the bull may be seen still running, pulled along, and being taken clear of the houses; the whole procession, la-place and standard-bearers in the van, run along behind him. In this way a field of sugar-cane is passed and an uncultivated area reached. On one side is a big tree, on the other a building. Having looked for and found the right spot in the bull’s neck a man drives in the blade of his matchet, almost vertically, behind the horns, slightly behind where matadors place the thrust called the descabello. The bull falls, as though struck by lightning. The base of his throat is then deeply cut into with a knife. The blood flows over the ground.’
Voodoo in Haiti Page 18
