{"id":3987,"date":"2012-03-16T10:43:20","date_gmt":"2012-03-16T16:43:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=3987"},"modified":"2012-03-16T11:12:17","modified_gmt":"2012-03-16T17:12:17","slug":"apotropaic-magic-size-9","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=3987","title":{"rendered":"Apotropaic Magic, Size 9"},"content":{"rendered":"

I don’t know if the custom of hiding used shoes and clothing in a house under construction to ward off evil influences <\/a>ever crossed the pond to North America from Britain. If you know of instances\u2014or of people still doing it\u2014let me know in the comments.<\/p>\n

I first learned of this custom at an archaeology conference at the University of Southampton <\/a>some years back. Archaeologists are delighted with such finds. Often they provide the only samples of ordinary people’s clothing, which otherwise would have been worn until it fell apart. <\/a><\/p>\n

The custom apparently went to Australia with the convicts and other early settlers<\/a>, however.<\/p>\n

\n
\"\"

Convict's shirt (BBC).<\/p><\/div>\n

A few blocks away from the Sydney Harbour Bridge is the imposing, vivid orange structure of the Hyde Park Barracks.<\/p>\n

Built to house some 50,000 unfortunate convicts transported from the UK between 1819 and the mid-1840s, the jail was among the first substantial structures constructed in the city.<\/p>\n

On the second floor, under the boards of a wooden staircase, workers found a striped prisoner’s shirt.<\/p>\n

[Historian Ian] Evans rejects the idea that the shirt could have been put under the stairs by accident. Just like the Harbour Bridge shoe, he believes it was hidden for a purpose.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

But if you are renovating an 18th or 19th-century building and find an old shoe under the floor, now you know why it was there\u2014maybe. (And did this custom die out completely, and if so, why?)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I don’t know if the custom of hiding used shoes and clothing in a house under construction to ward off evil influences ever crossed the pond to North America from Britain. If you know of instances\u2014or of people still doing it\u2014let me know in the comments. I first learned of this custom at an archaeology […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[19,21,37],"class_list":["post-3987","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-australia","tag-england","tag-folklore"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6xQTg-12j","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":8019,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=8019","url_meta":{"origin":3987,"position":0},"title":"Western Polytheists Have a Long Way to Go","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"May 8, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"For example, at our funerals, where are the dragon dancers? The all-female marching bands? The strippers? \"I want it to be boistrous. My father liked this kind of atmosphere.\" These Taiwanese make a New Orleans funeral look positively Lutheran. And it's much the same in mainland China, where the spicy-funeral\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"China\"","block_context":{"text":"China","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=china"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6757,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=6757","url_meta":{"origin":3987,"position":1},"title":"Clerical Dress for Respect, Christian and Pagan","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"October 7, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"It happened this afternoon that I had tabs open to two different articles about clothing and social respect for (Protestant Christian) clergy as well as a Wild Hunt post about some kind of Pagan trying to prank the county commissioners in Escambia County, Florida, into abandoning their custom of religious\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"American religion\"","block_context":{"text":"American religion","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=american-religion"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1214,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=1214","url_meta":{"origin":3987,"position":2},"title":"Did a ‘Pagan’ Bury the Staffordshire Hoard?","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"September 25, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"The \"Staffordshire Hoard\" is a cache of 7th-century Anglo-Saxon sword jewels and other items recently found in England (and a great boost for metal-detector sales, no doubt).The caption on one slide of the golden hoard suggests that because a gold cross was folded in on itself before burial, the person\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"archaeology\"","block_context":{"text":"archaeology","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=archaeology"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":14280,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=14280","url_meta":{"origin":3987,"position":3},"title":"People of Wheat: Decoration Day on the High Plains","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"May 26, 2026","format":false,"excerpt":"\/ Twiiter user Clay Scott @scottwestacre) who raises wheat in southwestern Kansas, posted this video on Memorial Day -- once known as Decoration Day, from the custom of decorating graves on that day. He wrote, \"Decoration Day. We place wreaths of wheat each year on the graves of family and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"American religion\"","block_context":{"text":"American religion","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=american-religion"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":10752,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=10752","url_meta":{"origin":3987,"position":4},"title":"A Little-Known Welsh Magical Practice","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"August 2, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"Burying large reptiles under the floor. It must be a \"Pagan survival,\" right? Doubtlessly an apotropaic custom, like scorch marks on wooden beams as charm against fire, or leaving old shoes and such inside the walls during construction.","rel":"","context":"In \"animals\"","block_context":{"text":"animals","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=animals"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/caiman.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":3472,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=3472","url_meta":{"origin":3987,"position":5},"title":"Not *My* Ancient Pagan Survival","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"November 9, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"All right, you have put away the skulls, bats, and dishes for your ancestors, all the while humming, \"It's the Most Magickal Time of the Year.\" It's time to think about Yule! And to ponder, is this custom an ancient Pagan survival? (Slightly NSFW.) As for your pre-Christian traditional Yule\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Samhain\"","block_context":{"text":"Samhain","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=samhain"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3987","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3987"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3987\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3991,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3987\/revisions\/3991"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3987"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3987"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3987"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}