Know Why Rabbits are Considered as Lucky Charm for Some while Some Consider as Symbol of Dark Force
We have seen all kinds of lucky-charms being used all around the world, some of which are in use for a very long time. A foot of hare or rabbit is one of those lucky-charms mostly used in the English-speaking countries (specifically the US and Great Britain), and China.
Superstitions around Rabbit's foot :
A lucky rabbit’s foot is a must-have for a gambler or a risk-taker. Ancient people all over the world from the Aztecs to the Chinese ascribed magical properties to the rabbit seeing it as a symbol of cunning and survival. The rabbit is one of the animals which tends to have a symbolism after it. They represent abundance, prosperity, and fertility. The rabbits are capable of reproducing and build ancestry; therefore, they also represent longevity. A rabbit’s foot could be considered as a totem, which is a spirit being or a sacred object or symbol that works as an emblem of a specific group of people such as a clan, family, tribe or lineage. It has a spiritual connection with the humans who considered themselves descended from rabbits or hares carried parts of the animal’s body for good luck. Rabbits are sacred for the European Celts because they used to spend so much time underground, they inhabited the sign of rabbit by the underground spirits. Some even associate the rabbits with shape-shifting witches, and this darker side seems to be reinforced by certain elements of the rabbit’s foot.
The rear half of an animal, as well as its left, is ascribed by the people to be shady and had a negative influence. Therefore, in some people’s view, the foot of a rabbit symbolizes the dark forces. But most of the people consider it good luck. It depends on the person how a person is going to view the rabbit’s foot. German and Scottish folklore placed a special emphasis on the rabbits relative, the hare which was considered capable of placing an evil eye on people probably because it is one of the few animals born with its eyes open.
The antidote, obtaining the animal’s hindfoot. Carrying a rabbit’s foot got popularized in the 19th century through the African American magical tradition called Hoodoo. Used by the American slave traders, the term Hoodoo was used to describe the traditional African practices. Hoodoo sounds like voodoo, but they are two different things as voodoo refers to religion, and Hoodoo is a folk practice. Rabbit’s foot was once used to apply makeup but lingered as a performer’s good luck charm. Traditionalists believed that the lucky rabbit’s foot must be from the left hind leg of the rabbit’s, killed during a full moon in a cemetery by a cross-eyed man.
Violence:
While some people say that the foot must be acquired while the rabbit is still alive. Some even say that the rabbit must be killed on a Friday, a rainy Friday, or Friday the 13th. And people are so into these kinds of superstitions that they make up things like the rabbit must be shot by a silver bullet. For the rabbit’s foot to work effectively, there are many ways to carry it around. Like in the left pocket, around the neck as an amulet, in a pocketbook, etc. Some people just want to keep it nearby, no specific place is needed for them for it to work, they trust it so much that they believe it will work anyway. Yet when we encounter a rabbit’s foot today, it is often a sanitized affair that died of gaudy colors and attached to a brass color keyring, a commercial item said to bring good luck to anyone except, of course, the unfortunate creature from which it came.
Up Next: Deaths come in threes! Why Number 3 is Considered Unlucky? The Secret Behind Age-Old Superstition
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