who’d-a-thunk a sub-par wes craven flick from the 80’s would lead me to items of interest? after watching serpent and the rainbow recently i went off in search of voodoo and found veves. quote: In vodou (Voodoo) practice, veves are intricate symbols of the loas (gods), and are used in rituals. each loa has his or her own complex veve, which is traced on the ground with powdered eggshell or cornmeal prior to a ritual. the ability to draw a veve correctly is considered to be the skill of an initiate. the better drawn a veve is the more powerful in invocation it is. see below for a few examples

interesting stuff. evidently veves are not specific to haitti either. quote: In all of the Kongo-derived religions in the Americas use is made of sacred ideograms to represent deity. These signatures have different names in Cuba, Haiti, and Brazil but all act as summoners of the spirits. In the Caribbean they are most often drawn using Cascarilla, or finely powdered eggshell, in Brazil where they may been drawn in a variety of colors they are usually drawn with a specially prepared chalk. These chalks are called “Pembas” after the Kikongo word mpembe meaning “white”.

for more info on vodou / vodun / voodoo try the open directory page.

g’night.