Devil's Shoestring: Magical Properties & Uses

Bundles of the wiry root are carried or hung for protection, gambling luck, and the securing or keeping of employment, the classic uses in Hoodoo practice. Lay it at a threshold to trip up harm before it enters, or keep nine pieces in the pocket when seeking work. Worked as a charm, not taken internally. Its African American Hoodoo lineage is named, not absorbed.

Devil's shoestring is used as a charm material rather than a medicine in this tradition, and is not taken internally. The plant sold under the name varies by region (commonly species of Viburnum), so botanical identity should be confirmed before any other use.

Devil's shoestring is a Hoodoo charm root, its wiry lengths said to trip up the Devil himself, which is how it came by its name. In the African American folk tradition of the American South, job-seekers carried nine pieces to find work and gamblers kept them for luck. Like High John, it belongs to a living Black American tradition and is named here as such, not flattened into generic witch-lore. The plant identity varies by region, often a viburnum or a honeysuckle root.