It’s the season of ghosties and goblins and night hags. Try some blue for relief.
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Haint blue porch ceiling. Photo courtesy of Lake Lou.
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Like many Americans, I painted my porch ceiling a soft,
watery blue (when I had a porch). I knew it was originally a Southern custom,
but it’s one that also has surprising traction in the Northeast. No matter what
color your house is, it’s a pretty, restful detail, especially on an overcast
day.
I didn’t realize that we get that tradition from Hoodoo. That’s the
folk magic of the low-country Gullah
people. It has African and Creole roots, overlaid by the Bible. The Boo Hag is a regional
variation of the night hag.
This is a worldwide mythological idea that gives us the modern expressions nightmare
and hag-ridden.
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The Nightmare, 1781, by Henry Fuseli. Courtesy Detroit Institute of Arts. The night-hag was a worldwide explanation for sleep paralysis, nightmares, shortness of breath, and waking up feeling tired.
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Hags gain strength from riding or sitting on their victims.
Boo Hags, in particular, get sustenance from their victim’s breath. Because
they have no skin, they’re red. So, to be less obvious, they steal human skin
and wear it for as long as it lasts. Talk about disposable ‘fast fashion.’
Once the hag finds a potential victim, she gains access to
the house and then hovers over her victim sucking out its breath. Of course,
the hag must be back in its hole by dawn, so the victim either awakes as if out
of a terrible dream, or feeling tired and out of sorts. Like my husband this
morning.
Back to the blue paint. That color was originally called ‘haint
blue’ and was made with the fermented leaves of the indigo plant. Adding lye
causes the color to precipitate into something that can be pressed, dried and
powdered and—voila! It’s a stunner of a color, still worn all over the world in the form of blue jeans.
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Indigo dye. Photo courtesy of Evan Izer (Palladian).
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Indigo is among the oldest dyes known to mankind, and
therein lies its first mystery. Its development and manufacture originated in India
and southeast Asia, but the oldest known example of indigo-dyed fabric (6000
years) was discovered in Peru.
By the time our slave trade was being developed, indigo was a
plantation crop in the American south. How the paint color became a talisman to
ward off haints and hags is conjecture. Either it mimicked the appearance of
the sky so spirits could pass right through, or it looked like water,
which ghosts couldn’t cross.
Or, there was something about the color that repelled insects.
That actually might be true, although it isn’t true today. Indigo dye was made
with lye, and there was lime in the historic milk (casein) base. The resultant
paint may indeed have been a good bug repellent.
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Remnants of Haint Blue ceiling at Owens-Thomas House
slave quarters. Photo courtesy of Telfair Museums.
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The Gullah people used this beautiful blue far more
liberally than we do today. They painted it on their porches, doors, window frames,
shutters, even ceilings. It barred entrance, and if the haints got in, it encouraged
them to scoot.
I can tell you, however, that haint blue doesn’t repel the
short, costumed witches, goblins and other creatures of modern Halloween. As
long as we had a blue-ceilinged porch, they came out in droves, like locusts. And
it was great fun.
A special thanks to Jennifer Johnson, who told me this story
in painting class yesterday.