The Encyclopedia of 5000 Spells - Judika Illes 2009
Theft, Lost Objects, and Missing Persons
The Spells
Spells for the Victims of Theft
Anti-theft Spells
Prevention of theft may be easier than regaining possession of stolen items:
Amethyst Theft Protection Spell
Wearing an amethyst allegedly protects against pickpockets and other thieves.
Anti-theft Spell Caraway
Burn caraway seeds as incense in the home. This allegedly prevents the theft of possessions.
Garlic Theft Protection Spell
Perhaps it’s no surprise that garlic is the primary ingredient in Four Thieves Vinegar. Hang braids consisting of a dozen garlic bulbs each at gateways to your home.
Gentian Theft Protection Spell
Keep gentian in your pockets and purse to protect yourself from thieves of all kinds, including cheaters and embezzlers.
Hyssop Theft Protection Spell
Grow hyssop around the home to repel thieves.
Key to Safety Spell
This spell to protect and fortify your home’s defenses requires a collection of keys. How many? At least one for every door in your home.
Beginning at your front entrance and ending at the back door, walk through your home.
At each and every door, stop. Take one key and touch it to the door, murmuring:
Key, lock out thieves in the light.
Key, lock out thieves in the night.
Repeat until a key has been touched to each door.
When the process is complete, tie all the keys together with a red ribbon.
Hang them over the front door.
Licorice Theft Protection Spell
This spell utilizes the licorice herb, not the candy named after it. Stick a licorice stick in each corner of your property, like a stake, to protect against break-ins, theft, and vandalism.
Southernwood Anti-theft Spell
Southernwood protects against thieves. Carry a twig as a talisman, and place southernwood twigs beside items requiring protection.
Vetiver Home Protection Spell
Create an infusion by pouring boiling water over vetiver roots. Strain and use the liquid to cleanse your home, concentrating on doors, windows, and vulnerable areas, to set up a magically protective boundary against robbery.
Vetiver Personal Protection Spell
Add essential oil of vetiver to your bath to set up a magical aura of protection against thieves.
Start the Search Spells
Beryl Spell
Hold a beryl in the same hand in which you would hold your missing object.
Focus upon the object and your desire for its return. Visualize the object then let your mind clear.
Let the beryl transmit thoughts, clues, and advice to you: pay attention to spontaneous thoughts and inspiration.
Directional Spell (1) Animal
This spell operates under the assumption that animals know more than they’re capable of telling but that given a system of communication, important details may be revealed.
Draw a circle of grain. This spell is typically cast with a rooster or mouse, hence the grain, but adjust it to fit the needs of your own animal helper.
Place the animal in the center of the circle, gently turn him or her around a few times, as though playing Blind Man’s Bluff, and then let the creature go where he or she will.
The direction taken indicates the direction where the search for your missing article should begin.
Directional Spell (2) Axinomancy
The divination method, axinomancy, may be used to locate thieves and stolen property.
Thrust a hatchet into the ground, its head down and its handle rising perpendicularly in the air. Everyone present dances vigorously around in a ring until the handle totters and falls to the ground. The end of the handle will indicate the direction where the search for the thieves and/or stolen articles must begin.
Directional Spell (3) Compass Candle
“Compass candles” are tapers that drip excessively, the type that used to be placed in Chianti bottles so that they would become covered with wax. Beyond scenic ambience, these candles may be used to magically determine where the search for lost or stolen articles should begin.
Hold the candle in your hands and charge it with its mission.
Place it in a holder on a flat surface.
Determine the cardinal points: north, south, east, and west. Be very clear about this so that there is no confusion or argument later.
Burn the candle.
The drippiest side of the candle, the one with the waxen waterfall, indicates where your search should begin, although not necessarily where the article will be found.
If a direction cannot be determined, this indicates that the direction is as yet unclear: crucial information is lacking. Further research and consideration are needed.
Directional Spell (4) Crossroads
Spin around at a crossroads until you’re so dizzy you fall down. The direction your head points when you fall is where you should begin your search.
Directional Spell (5) Dog
Induce a dog to reveal details of your theft. This spell necessitates locating a dog within a home or behind a gate. The dog does not need to be your own although it could be. The key is that the dog needed for this spell should be a dog that doesn’t bark without provocation, not one of those dogs that won’t stop barking as soon as anyone approaches.
Gently knock on the door or gate with a hammer, saying, “Bark dog, bark. Where is my ___?” Pay attention to which direction the initial bark comes from. This is a clue as to where to begin your search.
Dream Location
To locate missing or stolen articles:
Combine heliotrope blossoms and bay laurel leaves.
Fold them into a white cotton handkerchief or sew them up into a flat sachet. Watch out for a bay leaf’s sharp points!
Place the sachet under your pillow.
Pay attention to your dreams and spontaneous thoughts in order to shine a light on the location of your object.
Frau Wachholder Stolen Property Recovery Spell
Frau Wachholder, Guardian Spirit of the Juniper, is a German tree spirit. Request her assistance for the return of stolen property.
Write a petition or compose one in your mind.
Gently bend a lower branch of a juniper tree or bush toward Earth and secure it there with a stone. Do not break or injure the tree. (Bring lots of water as a libation and peace-offering just in case you do.)
If you have a written request for Frau Wachholder, slip it under the stone.
Demand that the thief hear your call and return your property.
Allegedly the thief and/or the property will be brought to you via Frau Wachholder’s interventions. When this is done, remove the stone and release the branch. Offer libations and a gift. Vowing to plant more junipers is effective.
Golden Rod Divining Spell
Hold a golden rod bloom in your hand. Concentrate on what’s lost or hidden but keep your eye on the golden rod. Allegedly the flower will “gesture” in the direction your search should begin.
Horseshoe Spell
Despairing of ever seeing your lost articles again?
Finding a horseshoe is an auspicious, encouraging sign from the universe regarding the reappearance of missing articles. Keep an eye out for unorthodox horseshoes, too, like charms, jewelry or images in addition to “real” horseshoes.
Drive the horseshoe into your fireplace so that it is fixed firm.
Visualize what was lost back in your hands.
Locate Missing Objects Spell
To locate missing persons and objects let three drops of blood from your left middle finger fall onto the nail of your right middle finger. The manner and pattern in which they drop is believed to reveal significant information regarding where the missing item or person will befound.
Mallow Magic Path Spell
Place mallow leaves in your shoes. They’ll allegedly cast a magical path toward missing objects or treasure.
Missing Object Spell: Lost Keys
Keys seem to be the object most likely to be lost. Saint Zita is the matron saint of lost keys. Appeal to her to find them quickly. Saint Zita, a thirteenth-century Italian saint, spent her entire life serving one family as a housemaid, although she spent all her time ministering to the poor, giving away her employer’s clothing and food as she deemed necessary. Her employers were frequently displeased with her; apparently Zita considered her employment to be a source of penance.
A humble saint, Zita requires no elaborate offerings or complex rituals. If your keys are missing, chant:
Zita, Zita
I’ve lost my key!
Look around please
And bring it to me
Should Saint Zita perform a large favor for you, her offering of choice is a contribution to the poor or homeless in her name.
Queen’s Delight Search Spell
Queen’s Delight Root is believed to possess divinatory power. Burn the root; the direction of the resulting smoke allegedly recommends the direction to begin your search.
Regain Stolen Goods
A wax image may be created to stimulate the return of stolen goods. The theory behind this spell is that angels despise theft and will assist your attempts at recovery:
Prick a wax figure made to represent the thief.
Allegedly, your guardian angel will transfer the pain to the guardian angel of the thief, who in turn passes on the pain to the thief directly.
The thief will subliminally associate the pains with the theft (pangs of guilt?) and return the goods in order to stop the pain.
Regain Stolen Money Spell
Burn pine incense to regain stolen money.
Rub a drop of essential oil of pine on your hands.
Use another drop to dress a pinecone.
Hold it over your head and twirl it around sunwise, requesting that the stolen money be returned.
You may also fashion a wreath of pine needles and wear this on your head while you request the money’s return. No need to dress with oil.
Silver Cord Spell
Spells that rely upon nothing more than your own magical powers seem simple and uncomplicated but can be extremely difficult. Be patient and practice; visualizations strengthen with time and experience. (Adjust the visualization so that it suits you; if the concept of something emerging from your naval is distasteful, consider what works better for you.)
Visualize the object that is missing.
Visualize a radiant silver cord emerging from your naval and attached to that object.
Visualize the cord reeling the object toward you.
Allegedly the object will return to you within a few days.
Vervain Search Spell
Charge vervain with your quest. Wear it within an amulet bag; allegedly it will help you find what you search for.
Reveal the Thief Spells
Reveal the Thief Spell
Place a tiny bit of the same material as what was stolen in the hearth or stove. Allegedly this makes the criminal writhe with pain. In a small community this leads to quick identification of the thief.
Reveal the Thief: Balls of Clay
Discover the identity of the thief:
Knead little balls of clay. Inscribe the name of a suspect on each.
Leave one blank, to indicate someone you haven’t yet suspected.
Drop them into a pot of water.
Recite Psalm 16.
Command aloud: “Reveal who stole
________________________[name the items].”
The first ball to rise up to the top of the water indicates the thief.
Reveal the Thief Divination Spell
Burn benzoin incense to prime the psychic faculties.
Pour a little black ink into the palm of your hand.
Let your mind be blank, then gaze into your palm and search for clues as to the identity of the thief and the present location of what is rightfully yours. (Do not expect to see the literal image in your palm, although nothing is impossible. Keep your mind in a meditative state and let inspiration and knowledge happen.)
Reveal the Thief Dream Spell
Place calendula blossoms beneath your pillow to dream the identity of your thief.
Reveal the Thief Spell: Fast of the Black Hen
To discover a thief and recover lost articles.
First you need a black hen.
For nine Fridays, both you and the hen must fast. (There are different interpretations of the word fast, from total abstention from food and drink to limiting the diet to plain bread and water. Interpret as you will: remember the goal is not to harm either the hen or yourself.) While fasting, concentrate on the theft: focus on the return of the goods and on the thief’s identity being revealed.
If you are very angry, you can focus on the thief being punished should restitution not be made. This spell is as positive or negative as you make it.
At the end of the nine Fridays, the thief will allegedly feel compelled to reveal his or her identity and return the plunder. Should he or she resist, terrible calamities will allegedly befall him.
Once the fast is over, you and the black hen must return to your normal lives.
Reveal a Thief Spell: Iron
In certain parts of the world, sacred oaths are sworn on iron in the same manner that they are sworn on the Bible or Koran. That sacred quality is expected to induce a thief to identify him or herself.
Place an anvil at a crossroads or in front of your home.
Place salt, bread, and a white candle on top of the anvil.
Light the candle.
Everyone even remotely suspected or implicated in the theft must temporarily contribute an iron tool. These are placed around the anvil.
The victim of the theft adds another lit white candle to the anvil and asks the guilty party to step forward and claim responsibility.
The ritual demands that should the guilty party now step forward and confess and either return the property or make amends, then the slate is clean and the case is closed. The ritual is immediately concluded with forgiveness, peace and at least an attempt at no hard feelings. If, on the other hand, it is unclear whom, if anyone, is the thief then each person present kisses the anvil, the bread, and the candles. Each picks up his or her own tool and strikes the anvil with it. Together everyone curses the thief, wishing him or her misfortune until that time when he or she confesses and makes amends.
Reveal the Thief Spell: Queen of the Meadow
This spell reveals a thief’s gender for easier identification.
Toss a Queen of the Meadow root into water. If it sinks, your thief’s a man. If however, it floats, your thief is a woman.
Reveal the Thief Powder
Grind equal quantities of galangal root, vetiver, poke-root and hydrangea blossoms and blend them together. Sprinkle the powder where the theft occurred or where whatever was stolen was last seen. The thief’s identity should become apparent shortly.
Reveal the Thief Sunflower Spell
Place three sunflowers under your pillow to dream of your thief.
San Cipriano Theft Revenge Spell
This spell will not bring your property back, nor will it locate or identify the thief. Instead it’s a pay-back spell that allegedly causes the thief to suffer.
Carve a white candle so that it is reversed: slice the top off the candle, flattening that end and expose the wick on the bottom so that it may be lit.
Dress the candle with substantial quantities of San Cipriano Oil and roll it in salt.
Talk to the candle; describe your loss, the injustice done and what you perceive the thief deserves, then light the candle.
Spiritual Detective Services
Sometimes you need a bit of professional help.
Saint Anthony’s Detective Service Spell (1)
Saint Anthony is the legendary hero who returns and locates missing or stolen objects.
Various rhymes exist to serve as a petition. Here’s one example:
Tony, Tony, look around!
Something’s lost and must be found!
Many swear that uttering the rhyme is sufficient. There are others who, disrespectful as it may seem, prefer to turn an image of Saint Anthony upside down in the belief that this discomfort causes the saint to work harder.
Saint Anthony’s Detective Service Spell (2)
The Totonac people of Mexico have a variation on this theme. Their version of the Saint Anthony spell suspends the saint in mid-air:
Attach a cord to St Anthony’s image and use it to hang him upside down, with his head in the air.
Remove the cord and turn him right side-up when the item has been returned.
Give Saint Anthony a finder’s fee.
San Cipriano Spell
There are two martyred Saint Cyprians, both allegedly converted magicians who renounced the enchanted arts for Christianity. There are no records to demonstrate whether this is true, however, following death at least one of the Saint Cyprians seems to have reverted to magical ways. Saint Cyprian is the patron saint of magicians. As San Cipriano, he is the most influential force in Iberian magic. The influence has spread to
Spain and Portugal’s former Western hemisphere colonies. San Cipriano is a wonder-worker, a master magician, who reconciles lovers, offers spiritual protection, locates buried treasure, and finds lost or stolen articles. The condition oil named in his honor expresses his power.
Hold a brown candle, charging it with your desire.
Carve it with your name, identifying information and information regarding what needs to be found.
Dress the candle with San Cipriano Oil.
Burn it.
Three Magi Spell
This spell may be used to locate missing persons as well as missing objects: the Magi were able to follow a star in order to locate Baby Jesus in the manger. Let them inspire your powers of detection.
Use the names of the three Magi to create a sigil. This sigil is believed to produce dreams providing clues, directions, and answers.
Inscribe the names Caspar, Melchior, and Balthazar onto a beeswax tablet.
Put it under your pillow.
To Catch a Thief
A Japanese foot print spell encourages the capture of thieves.
Following a home robbery, find and gather up the thieves’ footprints completely.
Let the police complete their investigations before you gather them but note which footprints belong to the thieves and which to investigators and onlookers. Burn mugwort in the dirt. This encourages the guilty parties’ capture by police and prevents the thieves from getting far away easily or painlessly.
Venus Flytrap Capture Spell (1)
If the thief’s identity is known to you and you would like either to contact him or see him captured, write his or her name or other symbols that resonate for you on a tiny piece of paper. Feed it to a Venus flytrap. If the plant accepts the paper, the thief will be caught.
Venus Flytrap Capture Spell (2)
Perhaps the thief’s identity is unknown or even irrelevant. You want your stuff back.
Draw a symbolic representation of your stolen object on a tiny bit of paper. Feed it to a Venus flytrap for it to be returned to you.
Treasure Hunter’s Spell
Searching for treasure? Find it using the technique of axinomancy.
Heat the head of an axe until red hot, then place the axe so that the edge stands perpendicularly in the air.
Balance a round agate on this edge. If it stays in place, there’s no treasure. The divination is over. If, however, it rolls away, the treasure exists.
Replace the agate on the axe-head, two more times for a total of three times. If each time, the agate rolls to the same spot or in the same direction, you have been given instructions as to where to begin your search. But if the agate rolls in a variety of places and directions, the treasure does exist but you must search for further information.
Spells For Thieves
Door Unlocking Spells
Why are these spells here? There are many, many good reasons that have nothing to do with theft for why one would need to open a locked door to which one does not have a key. Of course, should one possess the right to enter, summoning a locksmith might be easier. Just in case, however, you find yourself outside a locked door without a key, without anyone willing to let you in, and without access to a locksmith, let’s hope that you’re carrying lotus root or moonwort, or (better still) chicory.
Door Unlocking Spell (1) Lotus Root
Place a lotus root beneath your tongue. Face a locked door and say “Sign Argis.” Allegedly the door should open.
Door Unlocking Spell (2) Moonwort
Place a bit of moonwort into a keyhole to loosen the lock
Magical Key Spell
Chicory allegedly removes obstacles. If gathered correctly, it may open locks. Silently gather chicory on Midsummer’s Eve at midnight, or on Midsummer’s Day at twelve noon, using a golden knife. Dry the plant. Allegedly this will serve as a key to open locks if it is held against them.
The Hand of Glory
This notorious and legendary amulet was reputedly the master item of thieves’ magic spells in Western Europe and the British Isles. Allegedly the Hand of Glory ensured the sound sleep of anyone inside a house where it was carried, most frequently for purposes of theft. The word “sleep” may be used but “comatose” is what is meant. People within the house were rendered insensible and immobile, unable to awaken, sleeping like the dead. That’s appropriate because the Hand of Glory is the hand of a dead man crafted into a candle.
Crafting a Hand of Glory
Either the left or right hand was acceptable, however the Hand of Glory can only be crafted from the hand of a convicted felon, executed by hanging, preferably at a crossroads and preferably convicted for murder.
The most famous instructions are those suggested by Le Petit Albert, the influential grimoire published in Cologne in 1722:
Take the hand of a dead hanged man. Wrap it in fabric and press to remove remaining fluids.
Place it in an earthen vase.
Grind cinnamon, saltpeter, salt, and peppercorns with a mortar and pestle.
Cover the severed hand with the resulting powder. Leave it alone for fifteen days.
Then expose the hand to the sun during the Dog Days of Summer until completely dry. (In other words, you have to time this spell—and presumably acquisition of the hand in this era long before refrigeration—to coordinate with the Dog Days.)
If the hand is still not completely dehydrated, you may place it in a low, slow oven with ferns and vervain, until this is accomplished.
Use the hand as a candleholder. Form candles from the hanged man’s fat, virgin beeswax, and “sesame of Lapland.”
Hand of Glory Formula #2
Slightly different instructions for constructing a Hand of Glory exist. They are identical until Step 2 above, placing the hand in the earthenware vessel. There it must remain for only fourteen days, covered with salt, nitre, long peppers and what is believed to be verdigris. The rest of the instructions follow as suggested in Le Petit Albert.
Using the Hand of Glory
There were different recommended methods of use for a Hand of Glory.
Long-term Use
Either of these methods was recommended for repeat use of the Hand of Glory:
Place a single candle in the palm of the Hand.
Attach a candle to each finger.
Single Use Hand of Glory
The digits themselves might actually be set aflame, although this definitely created a single-use hand. Seems like a lot of trouble for a candle that can only be used once? The advantage of this method was that the Hand would then serve as an oracle, providing safety for the thief.
To ensure that everyone in the house is asleep, typically one finger was lit for every person in the house. (Presumably it was impractical to rob a building housing a crowd of more than five.)
Should one finger, especially the thumb, refuse to light, this indicated that someone was awake or even immune to the spell.
Hand of Glory Quick Fix Version
For those who were impatient and eager to use the Hand, there was a quick-fix method foregoing the complex ritual preparations: simply coat the severed hand of a hanged murderer with wax and attach wicks to the fingertips.
Hand of Glory: Really Quick Fix
A version attributed to Central European Romany foregoes the complex ritual and the hanged murderer and the whole hand. All this really quick-fix method requires is the left thumb of a dead person, lying in the grave for nine days, dug up, severed, and used as a candle in order to plunge an entire household into deep sleep.
Hand of Glory Concluding the Spell
Because the Hand of Glory is such a unique, unconventional candle, regular methods of extinguishing the flames can’t be used.
Immerse the Hand of Glory in milk.
Allegedly once the candle(s) are lit, this is the only way to extinguish the Hand of Glory.
Hand of Glory: Leg of Glory?
Once upon a time, Ruthenian thieves allegedly poured tallow into the hollow of a human shinbone, dug from a grave. The tallow was lit; the thief then marched around the targeted building three times holding the lit “candle” to put the residents to sleep.
Hands of Glory—Hands of Power: The Facts
It’s hard to determine exactly how much truth there is in any of this. It was a fairly common accusation during the witch-craze to accuse witches of using a Hand of Glory to break into churches, especially to steal sacramental articles. Virtually all records that survive from the witch-craze were extracted under horrible, merciless torture or reflect the torturers themselves. Was the Hand of Glory a true magical invention or were copycats inspired by witch-hunters’ fantasies? Did packs of thieves lurk at the crossroads, battling with each other for the opportunity to remove the dead man’s hand? Who can say?
The Hand of Glory may derive from misunderstandings of earlier amulets together with associations of death and sleep. For instance, valerian, a herb with sedative properties is nicknamed graveyard dust, because you’ll sleep like you’re dead. Since ancient days, the image of the hand appears as a protective symbol all over Earth. Today, the image retains greatest popularity in Semitic and Berber areas. The Jewish hamsa represents the Creator’s Five Fingers. The Islamic Hand of Fatima represents the hand of the Prophet Muhammad’s daughter, although the image with identical usage predates both religions. Italian amulets frequently come in the shape of hands: the fig hand, the horned hand for example. These hands are crafted from metal, wood, or similar and tend to be stylized rather than realistically depicted.
The amulet with the closest superficial resemblance to the Hand of Glory comes in the form of life-sized bronze hands, crafted in the early centuries of the Common Era. Many have survived and are in various museum collections. Some are nothing more than a naked hand, while others are decorated with snakes or pinecones. These hands were sacred to the Spirit Sabazius. Little is known of his cult, other than that snake-handling was involved. Eventually similar, although more elaborate hand amulets were crafted in Rome. Like a Hand of Glory with one candle on each finger, these Roman Mano Panthea, Hands of Power, depict an extremely realistic hand with a symbol on each finger.
This Pagan Hand leads directly to the Roman Catholic amulet, the Hand of Power, which resembles the Pagan Hand except that it now bears the signs of the stigmata. The Mano Poderosa is still extremely popular in Latin-American spiritual traditions and appears on many commercially manufactured seven-day candles for protection and blessing.
Lord of Thieves Birthday Spell
The seventeenth day of the Chinese eighth month is the birthday of the Lord of Thieves, patron of the light-fingered. He stole food, to keep his mother from starvation.
If the stealing has been good, offer him incense on his birthdays.
Post no images: he prefers not to be identified.
He also doesn’t like being trapped indoors: offer him petitions, Spirit Money and incense outside.
Lords of Thieves: Hermes/Teramo
Hermes, known in Italian as Teramo, sponsors thieves (merchants, too!) providing no violence or murder is planned or intended.
Call him by building a pyramid formed from stones at a four-way crossroads.
Concentrate on your request for him.
Stop up your ears, walk away. Create some sort of signal to yourself as to when to unstop your ears (count to a thousand or when you a red car or whatever).
The first words that you hear will indicate whether your petition has been accepted.
Sleep of the Dead Spelt
Take graveyard dirt from a fresh grave in a nearby cemetery and throw it over the house one wishes to burgle. Allegedly this causes the people within to sleep deeply.