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The Black Hen and the Frizzly Chicken

The Hyatt Files card: The Black Hen and the Frizzly Chicken

“A black frizzly hen won’t let nothin’ stay in de yard – he’ll scratch it up.” A Charleston informant said that, and plenty of Hyatt’s other informants agreed. The frizzly hen was the root doctor that lived in your yard.

Chickens ran loose round every Southern house, and in hoodoo they worked as both guard and remedy. The frizzled bird hunted out buried tricks. The black hen gave her blood, her body and her feathers to cure, protect and drive off spirits.

What it is

A frizzly (or frizzled) chicken has feathers that curl up and outward, as if blown the wrong way. Black birds were preferred in almost all of this work, and a black frizzly was best of all.

Hyatt himself gave the frizzly hen a margin title of its own: Doctor Frizzly.

What Hyatt’s informants said

The frizzly’s job was to dig. In Charleston a woman kept one because “if anybody put down any roots or anything fer ‘er, dat hen would scratch ’em up” (Hyatt 209 · Charleston, S. Car. · informant 495). She also believed that if the hen died, she would die after it.

Colour mattered. An Algiers informant was blunt: “dem othah chickens ain’t no good – git a black frizzly” (Hyatt 212 · Algiers, La. · informant 1602).

The bird’s own body showed the work. A frizzly that picked up a root went bald. In Wilson, North Carolina, they said that if your chicken began getting naked, that was what the buried thing was meant to do to you, and the chicken took it instead (Hyatt 211 · Wilson, N. Car. · informant 1456). In St. Petersburg the frizzly would find whatever had been laid to dress your home, scratch it up and destroy it (Hyatt 214 · St. Petersburg, Fla. · informant 977).

The black hen as sacrifice

For protection the black hen could go into the ground alive. A Brunswick informant said simply: “Take a black hen an’ bury it alive.” Buried under the steps, it would stop anyone who wanted to harm you from getting up to you (Hyatt 1160 · Brunswick, Ga. · informant 1215).

Chicken in cures

The split live-animal cure was one of the most widespread rites Hyatt recorded. A black hen, or a frog, was cut open while still alive and laid hot on the wound or the sick place to draw the poison out. Hyatt noted that the blood was the essential element in these rites, which were used for nearly everything.

Feathers

Feathers were burned as a smoke against spirits and trouble:

In their own words

“Ah jes’ took de hen up an’ jes’ let it bled on it, an’ it killed de shingles.”

(Hyatt 1163 · Waycross, Ga. · informant 1148)

“cut him open while he is alive – cut him open and put him on dat, it will draw all dat pizen out.”

(Hyatt 1164 · Charleston, S. Car. · informant 504)

“Black chicken feathers, they burn them tuh drive evil spirits, dey say.”

(Hyatt 1175 · Waycross, Ga. · informant 1154)

How it’s worked today

Rural rootworkers still keep frizzled hens as yard guards, and a balding frizzly is still read as a sign that something was laid down and found.

Black hens and their feathers remain in use in conjure and in related Caribbean and Afro-Atlantic traditions, for cleansing, for drawing out sickness and in offerings. Black feathers still appear in smoke and fumigation work for haunted or troubled houses.

Learn the work

Hoodoo Witch Certification Course

The course teaches protective and cleansing work from the old Southern tradition, including the animal and yard lore Hyatt recorded.

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Source: Harry Middleton Hyatt, Hoodoo – Conjuration – Witchcraft – Rootwork, 5 vols., 1970-1978. Numbers refer to Hyatt’s own item numbers; the town and informant number follow. Written by Hoodoo Witch in our own words, with short quotations from Hyatt’s informants for reference.