GREAT BRITAIN IS STILL a haven of magic. It is resting in the forests as well as in the suburbs, in the inner city centres and in village squares. You may not know it, but the man reading the paper over there next to you on the tube could very well be a druid, that woman in front of you in the queue at the bank a Wicca witch. British folklore has a long and momentous history and the worlds of the Abbots Bromley Horndancers, The Burryman of Queensferry, Greenmen, Morris dancers, Pearly Kings and Queens, Witches, Druids, Punch and Judy, Street Sweeping processions, Straw Bears, Hoodening Horses and Bonfire Societies are as full of mystery and enchantment as they are of joy and community. Simon Costin, distinguished artistic director, set designer and moreover also the director of the Museum of British Folklore, has been taking his small museum around ye olde Albion in an ornately decorated caravan, both documenting and partaking in this fascinating world of fantastical tales and peculiar characters. Here he helps us figure a couple of things out about what magical practitioners wear.

When you’re about to partake in an event or festival/ritual, what steps do you take to shake off your ‘everyday persona’ in order to become your ‘special’ one?

Martibogie (Jack in the Green Bogie): For me this begins with the anticipation and planning of the ritual – basically pre-empting the mind-set and purpose of the ritual. I don’t particularly place any heavy emphasis on what I’m wearing. I don’t believe that within traditional craft the adoption of specific ritual dress was necessary, although I imagine people would have worn something practical. Instead the moment I start assembling objects and working tools; setting up the altar, I start to ‘become’ magical.

Mol (Jack in the Green Bogie): It’s a question of volume; my ‘everyday persona’ is my ‘special’ one. That is, I try to live my life in a ‘holistic’ manner, but tone it down for most ‘everyday’ situations.

Raven (High Priestess of the Craft): I believe it is important to shake off the ‘everyday persona.’ In circle we are standing between the worlds so there is no place for everyday concerns. These would detract from the purpose and intent of the ritual. For me it is stilling the mind, usually through meditation. It doesn’t have to be long, it’s about switching focus.

Piri (High Priestess of the Craft): Very few, other than having a shower and getting changed, in the same way that I prepare to visit a friend.

Silver Eagle Spirit (High Priest of the Craft): I prepare by turning my mind into an altered state with the use of meditation or mantra and then into the energy we are going to use, according to the type of ritual. The use of robes helps one alter one’s mood.

Ray Lindfield (High Priest of the Craft): Writing the ritual is the art, then preparing everything needed for the ritual. This can include making incense, making cakes, deciding which equipment to use (i.e. indoors or outside) and making sure everything is clean and in good order. We also have robes and certain jewellery that we keep for ritual occasions. Just prior to starting a ritual we usually have time for a guided meditation/pathworking or a time of stillness to prepare our minds.

Simon Costin (Magical Practitioner): It all depends on the event and as to whether it is a public or private affair. If a public one, such as Jack in the Green, there is usually a weekend of build-up which includes dancing at the céilí, the gathering of leaves for the headdress and finally getting dressed into the costume on the morning of the event. All these things help to put you in a different mindset. If the event is a private ritual, a lot depends on where the ritual is taking place. If at home, I often have a bath and take a moment to sit quietly to concentrate on the task to be performed. If outdoors, the act of changing into robes always helps to get me in the right frame of mind.

Do you ever begin the ritual or event with any form of cleansing, be it drinking, eating or anything else?

Mar: In my own practice I place more emphasis on the physical act of cleansing the circle through sweeping or ‘smudging,’ rather than using salt to purify in the more ceremonial way. These are symbolic acts, which focus and dramatise the intention of purification, speaking directly to the subconscious mind through symbolic language.

Mol: Usually it’s a ten-second mind exercise, once a year it’s seventeen communal hip flasks. Just occasionally my mind refuses to play and I fail to get ‘into the swing.’

Rav: Before a ritual I take a bath to which some salt has been added. This is not the only cleansing that takes place. Before our circle is cast, the area is cleansed by the High Priestess. First by sweeping with a besom widdershins (anti-clockwise) to remove negativity. The bristles do not touch the ground. The negative energy is then cast out of the area to the east. Next, everyone attending is admitted and the four elements of earth, air, fire and water are blessed and consecrated. These are represented by salt, incense, a candle and a bowl of water. The ritual space and all those within are then cleansed and purified with each of the elements. It is only after this that the circle is cast.

Piri: I usually add clary sage oil to my water.

SES: With a ritual bath with herbs for the type of energy we are going to rise. We sometimes fast with no food for up to forty-eight hours or twelwe hours, more or less; once again it is entirely dependent on the type of ritual we are doing at the time.

RL: Cleansing often means a shower or bath just before the ritual, especially if it involves an initiation or elevation to a higher level. We often sweep the Circle at the opening of the ritual. The process of creating a sacred space involves the use of consecrated salt and water, sprinkled around the circle and over everyone in the circle which we believe is part of the cleansing process, together with incense which is wafted over everyone and a candle to represent fire, another purifying element.

SC: Again it depends on the event. If a daytime public one, such as Jack in the Green, most of the day revolves around stopping at pubs along the processional route. If a private ritual, I rarely eat or drink before as it helps to do that afterwards as a form of grounding.

How do the clothes and other accoutrements help to get you into an altered mindset?

Mar: The ambiance of the magic circle and the resulting mindset can be created through incense, music and various objects and ritual tools, much more so for me than what I’m wearing. For me certain objects that I find inspiring and magical play a big part in creating the atmosphere in the circle. It is this atmosphere that helps alter my mindset.

Mol: When doing Jack in the Green things, the smell of the body makeup (Kryolan) enforces my ‘Green Man’ persona.

Rav: Ritual clothing and other accoutrements do help to get into an altered mindset. The clothing we wear is usually a robe and it’s only worn in ritual. This also helps to put on the ‘magical persona’ needed to work between the worlds. It takes us out of the everyday world with all that world’s associations. However, the robe is not the only adornment we use. There is also jewellery worn only in circle such as a circlet or head-dress, a necklace and bracelet. Never a watch because we are outside time so it has no place in circle.

Piri: I use dress and colour according to the wheel of the year, or according to what feels right. After all, even in everyday life I wouldn’t feel right wearing a Christmas outfit and mistletoe earrings in the summer.

SES: The robes which we use are just for ritual. Normally we use the same robes all the time. It puts us in the right frame of mind. The tools that we use in the ritual help us to focus and to cut astral energy, for example with the athame, which is a ritual knife.

RL: A change of clothes is important, especially into robes. Incense is also a very powerful agent to trigger an altered consciousness as the sense of smell has a deep and dire link to a primal part of the brain.

SC: Masks can help greatly to alter your persona within a magical/ritual context and are a fascinating tool to use. Personally, I find that the objects used within a ritual help far more to produce any kind of altered mindset than the clothes do.

What importance do the clothes play in the rituals or events?

Mar: I work skyclad indoors, and wear something that fulfils the purpose of feeling comfortable outdoors. Usually I wear something black because it minimizes my attention towards what I’m wearing.

Mol: Public perception is altered, and I can get away with lots more!

Rav: Because the robe is loose it allows greater freedom of movement than tighter garments would. Since it is only worn in ritual it contains our own energy and it is energy we raise in circle for whatever the purpose of the ritual is. If we are celebrating a Sabbatt such as Lammas (grain harvest) we might act out a piece of mythology. The clothing is chosen appropriate to the role a person is playing. The colours used will often be chosen for their symbolic meaning. Again this will not be everyday clothing. This helps to get into the part in the same way an actor does.

Piri: It’s simple – they just help you to focus on what you are about to do. However, personally, I don’t think they play any significant importance. It is the intent that matters.

SES: None at all, except in a place where you cannot be without them, i.e. being covered up in public.

RL: The clothes only have specific importance if they are reserved for ritual or designed for a specific ritual, to aid taking on an alternative identity.

SC: Within the context of a public event, the clothes help to endow the wearer with a greater sense of themselves. You find yourself behaving differently when wearing a costume and you are often less inhibited. The costume helps to give you a new persona to project yourself from. With a ritual, a simple black robe does the opposite and is often worn as a form of anonymity. I find elaborate robes project ego and when working in a ritual context the will needs to be focused on the job in hand.

Have you ever been naked or skyclad for a ritual and how does it differ from being clothed?

Mar: Many times, but this is entirely dependent on how warm it is. I usually feel more distracted by my body when I’m naked than I do if I’m dressed. I do not subscribe to the belief that energy is impinged through the wearing of clothes when working magic. However if it is comfortable for me to wear nothing then that is fine. I do not believe I feel hugely different whether dressed or undressed.

Mol: Yes, and it’s colder. I usually prefer clothed, being a creature of comfort.

Rav: Skyclad, or ritual nudity, is so often misunderstood. It is not about a sex orgy. I have been skyclad in rituals. I feel it differs from being clothed in that the energy raised is direct from the body and not hampered by robes. For me there is another aspect to being skyclad. To quote from Doreen Valiente’s Charge of the Goddess, ‘And ye shall be free from slavery; and as a sign that ye be really free, ye shall be naked in your rites.’ I have certainly experienced this freedom. To be in a ritual where nobody is wearing any clothes is both freeing and validating. Nobody judges what you look like, whether young, old, fat or thin. Nobody particularly notices. This has been my experience. For me it also has to do with bonding because you are all there together, exactly as you are. As children of the Goddess and God, we are all connected.

Piri: From a personal point of view I think it is more ‘magical’ to be skyclad. It gives a greater feeling of belonging to a like-minded group of people that you trust implicitly.

SES: Yes many times. Rituals done skyclad are mostly in temples or private woods or groves. Being skyclad allows the energy from the body to be released in an easier manner, and for energy to be taken into the body.

RL: Yes, and it is different, it induces a sense of freedom. You don’t have to worry about catching robes on candles! It’s not for the self-conscious though, if you’re more worried about how you look you will not give the ritual your full attention. Whether skyclad or robed, it’s about freeing the mind from the everyday and what works best for you.

SC: I have been skyclad many times but only as a solitary practitioner, both indoors and out. A lot depends on the weather to be honest. It can be nice both at home and outside with a roaring fire going. Although quite liberating the first few times, in the end being skyclad is not essential for me – I would rather feel comfortable and able to concentrate.

How do you return to your everyday selves after a magical ritual or event?

Mar: This is a shift in thought for me, usually dramatised by the striking of a bell. This represents the end of a ritual and the circle being dissolved.

Mol: Normally through sleeping, as I like to be there till the bitter end. Sometimes a good long shower, but then I feel cheated if I have missed something. I am not a very ‘clothes conscious’ person, as you have probably observed, so I am probably less ‘altered’ than most performers.

Rav: When the ritual has ended we ground ourselves. This may be done through meditation and placing our hands on the earth to discharge any excess energy. The circle is opened, everything is packed away and the robes are exchanged for everyday clothing. We often go to the pub and socialise and in this way come back to our everyday selves.

Piri: Once you have shared something to eat and drink and the circle has closed, it is the natural progression of things to return – it just happens.

SES: Eat and drink cake and wine. Close down the seven main chakra’s, (except the Crown and Base which are already partly closed). Then ground any excess energy.

RL: Towards the end of a ritual we usually share cakes and wine and eating is the quickest way to ‘ground’ yourself. We also use an ‘earthing out’ gesture and literally touch the ground, whilst visualising all unused energies sinking into the ground.

SC: If a public event, there’s usually a chance to calm down in a pub and a discussion as to how the day went. Then finally taking a bath and scrubbing off any make-up completes the act. With a ritual there’s usually a period of closing down the area or circle used and giving time for the energy raised to dissipate having been directed. Food and drink help to complete the grounding.

Simon Costin is an artist, set designer and the founder of the Museum of British Folklore. In 2013, he became director of the Museum of Witchcraft and Magic in Cornwall.

Henry Bourne is a British photographer. His book portraying participants in this  country’s folk festivals, Arcadia Britannica: A Modern British Folklore, was published in 2015.

This article was originally published in Vestoj: On Magic.

Following their delayed admittance into the church in a leadership capacity, female priests inherited a relatively masculine-looking uniform – one that offers little variation where body types and sartorial taste are concerned. Upon their ordination, women in Warde’s position must adopt a standard code of dress. When leading services, clergy members don more formal, distinctive garments known as vestments alongside their ankle-length, long-sleeved robes, which oftentimes reflect the liturgical colour of the day or season of the religious celebration. Outside of church services, clergy people wear what they call clericals – essentially, their ‘street clothes.’ Along with a detachable white clerical collar, a black shirt, pants or a conservative pencil skirt for women are generally acceptable; these modest, non-distracting garments turn the focus away from materialism, thereby illustrating the wearer’s commitment to serving God and their communities as selflessly as possible, even in quotidian life.

Twenty-nine-year-old Rev. Warde has chosen to take an active stance against the stuffiness she saw in most clericals on offer. Instead of succumbing to years of dreary, ill-fitting garments for the sake of fitting in, Rev. Warde aims to modernise her wardrobe through a mix of DIY-alterations, thrift store hunting, and subtle – if liturgically appropriate – colour accents. In the process, she’s proved that dressing with a sense of moral responsibility and religious devotion need not imply a lack of style.

Rev. Warde has not been alone in this effort. Across the pond, Rev. Sandra Sykes, her friend Mandy Strevens and their daughters Sarah and Melissa founded what is thought to be Britain’s first retailer for ‘clergy couture.’ Rev. Sykes, an Anglican curate, points out, ‘So often all you can find is badly adapted shirts and women have been in the ministry for over twenty-five years. It almost seems like we are hidden as women rather than being celebrated…There’s a deeper theological thing to this. Women need to be recognised fully as women in ministry.’² 

As Rev. Warde tells it, the decision-making process required of dressing for work and leisure as a woman of faith occasionally feels like a curse – but she’s warming up to the idea that it might just be a daily blessing in disguise.

I love fashion generally – I’ve always loved it. On my Sabbath, I read InStyle sometimes. I mean, I read the Bible as well, but I do love a good InStyle. I follow Project Runway and I love What Not to Wear and all those sorts of things. I already had this teenage interest in fashion. Then I realised I would be given my work uniform, and my work uniform has a lot behind it – it carries a lot of weight when you walk into a room. That can either be a really good thing or it can be a really challenging thing.

I was trying to figure out what it was going to carry when I wore it and what it was going to say when I walked into a room – I think that matters. I kept looking at these [catalogue] pictures, and there was nothing wrong with them, but I just realised that I couldn’t imagine ever putting that [uniform] on and feeling beautiful. I don’t think that the priesthood requires that we trade feeling beautiful in order to serve God. Full disclaimer: I will say that my relationship to my own body has been a rollercoaster of just figuring out how to love the skin I’m in in the first place, much less adding a collar to it. I wanted to figure out how I could do this thing that I feel like God asked me to do with my life and that I want to very joyously do, but also hold up this interior feeling of beauty. I didn’t want to lose that feeling of beauty – a beauty that I believe God gave me – just because no one decided to give the girl in the catalogue a belt. I also saw all these ways that the clerical uniform could have been better. I just thought, it doesn’t have to be this way.

It’s typical to wear a black clerical shirt, some form of pants or a pencil skirt, maybe a blazer over it and heels. That to me would be the expected outfit to wear. And there’s nothing wrong with that – there are some people who make that exact wardrobe look amazing. But my body isn’t such that that actually looks good on me; it looks like I’m dressed up in my mom’s clothes when I wear an outfit like that. I’m 4’11” and curvy, so my figure doesn’t lend itself toward some of those lines that are a little bit more common … It wouldn’t surprise you that the priesthood – a male-dominated workforce – would have a more expected, masculine dress profile. But I don’t fall into that profile, so I’ve had to figure out how to wear clothes that I think flatter my body in an appropriate way, while also wearing this collar.

I’ll go to a boutique and find a black dress with scalloped edges on the bottom and on the sleeve, and I just put that over the collar. They have this thing called a ‘janie’ – it’s basically a ‘dickey,’ but it’s a ‘janie’ for women – and it hooks down right under your bra basically, and you can connect your collar to it. You would typically wear your undergarment, your janie, and something over it as long as it covers the janie. I take dresses from boutiques – like maybe a houndstooth dress, but it’s black-and-white – and I throw that over the janie and go. But that would not necessarily be something that most people have seen with a collar attached to it. The typical colour for clergy wear is black, but if you go to Women Spirit or Almy – companies that make clergy attire – you’ll see that now you can get clericals in myriad colours.

For my first ordination, I went to a Goodwill in Austin, Texas, and found this black, button-up shirt-dress. It was really cute and it was the appropriate length and everything; hitting right at or just above the knee is best. Why do I care about the length? I think when you meet with the priest, the greatest presence you should feel in the room is the presence of God. Sure, I want to teach and preach from a place of confidence that is sometimes enhanced by my clothing: but the thing of the greatest importance to me is that the people I care for feel God’s presence. I don’t want a hemline to distract from that. I’d rather break every fashion rule in the book than challenge that.

One of my seminary classmates was a former tailor and she was about to get ordained as well, and I said, ‘Would you mind tailoring this for me?’ She tailored it, so I wore the black dress, leggings and black wedges. The colour for an ordination is red, so I put on a red scarf; I thought it would be appropriate for the liturgical season, but I also thought it would be fun and offer some colour. I have a red pair of cowboy boots and since I’m a priest in Texas I always wear them on Pentecost. The only reason I can even remember what I was wearing is because I did get some comments, but they were all positive. People were commenting on how they’d never seen such a fashionable priest.

That said, I was serving in a diocese when I was ordained a priest that considered white to be the appropriate colour for the vestments for ordinations, which was new to me, but I went with it. White is how we recognise the majesty of resurrection: it’s how we celebrate All Saints, Easter, baptism Sundays, and funerals, because white celebrates the resurrection of Christ and how we share in that via our own resurrecting acts and our final resurrection in death.  Ordination could also be seen as a resurrecting act, because we take on a new way of life with new vows, new beauties, new challenges and new eternal joys. My colours change based on context.

The ironic thing about the clerical uniform is that one of the early significances of it was to make a clergy person be in the background. It was worn as an act of humility, so they wouldn’t be flamboyant; they wouldn’t be outwardly dressed in a way that would call attention to themselves. It’s ironic in a postmodern world, because I can’t walk into any place in a collar and not have a million people staring at me, like, ‘What on earth? Did a priest just walk into this coffee shop? And she’s also a woman? I don’t know what to do with that right now.’ That’s a whole other layer. The fashion aspect is constantly also being confronted with the reality that there are people who believe that women should not be ordained. And I have a physical manifestation of my ordination that goes with me when I walk into those places – that’s another challenge that just comes with it. Now the joy of it is that you also end up having conversations that you otherwise wouldn’t have had. People can see your collar and sometimes they have needed a sign for years that they could talk to someone, that they could have a prayer – you walk in, and you’re just trying to get your groceries, but they see this opportunity and there’s a really holy moment that is offered to me because of the fact that they can see on my neck an opportunity for a prayer or maybe hope or someone that they can trust. 

As far as negative feedback I’ve received, I think that every good has a shadow side. And the shadow side of adding fashion as a thing that I’m thinking about in my ministry is the idea that it might become self-centred – that putting on this collar might be about me. And to some degree, yes, by adding aspects of my personality to it, it is becoming about me. But my belief around that is that I’m not trying to take God out of it. God is the focus of my life and I want my life to be a ministry to God – I just think that God called me, Erin Jean Warde, to be a priest. And so I’m going to bring who God created me to be into that ministry. I think I want to honour the worry – that it then becomes self-centred and it’s no longer about God, it’s about you and your ego, and all of that Freudian, terrible stuff that we don’t want to show up in our priesthood – but at the same time, I think it’s okay to say, ‘I want to feel good about myself. I want to feel beautiful, because I believe that God desires that I would feel beautiful.’ That’s part of this abundant life that I believe the ministry is calling me into. 

If you know me personally, you know that I am comedic, I am extroverted, and I think that laughter is the best accessory to any outfit. But I’m also outspoken and I like to talk and I’m curious, so for me, I wanted those parts of my personality to be reflected in my fashion, even from before I was a priest. There is a connection for me between when I look my best and I feel like I look my best, in being able to more confidently walk into a room that might otherwise be intimidating. The life of being a priest, at least in my setting, involves standing in front of a lot of people. And it’s not necessarily four hundred people, but it’s a congregation of people. I think for me, it’s not so much appearance for the sake of anyone else, but I want to be able to feel self-confident, because that’s when I believe I do my best – for God and for the church.

My exploration is wrapped up in the fact that I am a very feminine person. I have really long hair, and I like to curl it, and I like red lipstick and I just went to a gala at my church in a black midi-dress with my collar and my red heels and a red lip. And it was fantastic. I loved every minute of it. That’s who I am. If you didn’t put me in a career where I would wear a collar, I would wear the same thing. It just wouldn’t have a collar on it. As I get older, and as I go through this journey of self-exploration, I’m just trying to figure out how to be the same person in every room I stand in.

Rev. Erin Jean Warde is the Associate Rector for Christian Formation at the Episcopal Church of the Transfiguration in Dallas, Texas.

Olivia Aylmer is a New York-based writer, editor and graduate of Barnard College at Columbia University.

1. B Tammeus, ‘Episcopal church celebrates 40 years of women in the priesthood.’ National Catholic Reporter, 28 July 2014 https://www.ncronline.org/news/faith-parish/episcopal-church-celebrates-40-years-women-priesthood ↩

2. J Bingham, ‘“Clergy couture” range launched for fashion-conscious female priests.’ The Telegraph, 21 May 2016 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/05/21/clergy-couture-range-launched-for-fashion-conscious-female-pries/ ↩

‘The hypnotic power exerted by things occult resembles totalitarian terror: in present-day processes the two are merged. The smiling of auguries is amplified to society’s sardonic laughter at itself; gloating over the direct material exploitation of souls.’

Theodor Adorno, Theses Against Occultism

IN HIS 1946 THESES Against Occultism, Adorno addressed the swiftness with which occultism, when translated onto the political stage, could provide fertile ground for exploitation.¹ Nowhere is this evidenced more theatrically than in the political intrigues of Haitian dictator François Duvalier, who from his election in 1957 to his death in 1971 harnessed and exploited the magical thinking of the Haitian people by dressing and acting like Baron Samedi, the voudou god of the dead. Duvalier used fashion to make implicit what he did not say explicitly: that he was a god, the god, of Haiti –and as such, was entitled not only to unmitigated power, but to absolution, loyalty, and even affection.

If Duvalier’s sartorial choices served to warn the people of Haiti that, like Baron Samedi, he controlled the border between life and death, they also had a secondary, more overtly political agenda couched in the Haitian ruler’s open advocacy for the religion of the Haitian majority: Duvalier legitimised voudou through his appropriation of the garments of one of its most precious deities. But, because much of the country’s budget was then underwritten by foreign aide, it was vital that, where a voudouist might see death incarnate, foreign administrations would simply see a man in a dark suit and glasses. His clothing, gestures and accoutrements served as a cipher, encoding to the Haitian people – to whom the significance of voudou iconography would have an immediate and visceral effect – but which would elude foreign observation.²

To unpack the political and sociological grounds for Duvalier’s psychological grip on the Haitian people, one must first understand the basic tenets of voudou, a religion that penetrates every facet of Haitian culture. Voudou dictates that below the surface of everyday life – which, for the Haitian, is a surface mottled with poverty and suffering – lies another, invisible realm, which runs parallel to our own but which is inhabited by voudou loa, or spirits. The role of the loa is a paternal and solicitous one: If respected and well nurtured, they provide protection and counsel, but can be fickle and quick to punish misdeeds. Loa are dependent on their living counterparts, requiring nourishment (literally, in the form of animal sacrifices) and attention (satisfied by voudou ceremonies led by houngan, or voudou priests).³

Entry to the spiritual realm is signified by the crossroads (represented figuratively as a cross within a circle, or a series of interlocking crosses), which figures symbolically into voudou ritual as the point of vertical axis between the physical and metaphysical planes. Crosses are drawn on the ground with flour, or traced in the air – around which participants in voudou ceremony writhe in a semi-circle, following a throbbing drum and rhythmic chanting.⁴ When a spirit manifests, it ‘mounts’ the body of the possessed person, like a rider on a feral horse. Images of possessed persons show them bucking, arms and legs akimbo and eyes rolled back, sometimes miming erotic behaviour, gyrating against trees or falling to the ground in a violent exhibition of mystical requisition.⁵

The goal of the voudou ceremony is to conjure these crossroads in order to make psychic contact with an otherwise unseen dimension. Of the voudou pantheon, deities closely associated with these points of contact are considered among the most powerful. Collectively called the gede, they are presided over by Baron Samedi, who – in alternating roles as healer, adviser and trickster – controls the portal between the living and the dead. Samedi is represented in voudou iconography as a corpse-like figure: white-painted or skull-like face, sunglasses (to protect eyes unaccustomed the brightness of the living), dark suit and top hat, and cane adorned with a phallus.⁶ Though certainly not the only ruler in history to strategically exploit costumery, his is among the most sinister – and, more importantly, the most self-conscious. Duvalier had studied the socio-cultural effects of voudou on the Haitian people and had co-authored essays on the subject.⁷

Voudou was the religion of the poor, black people of Haiti, and by becoming the first Haitian leader to publicly recognise voudou as a national religion, Duvalier legitimised the worldview of the common Haitian citizen. Though the majority of Haitian people were black, the mulatto class then controlled most of the wealth and was more closely aligned with foreign economic and religious power. Duvalier had campaigned on an anti-plutocratic, populist platform, eschewing foreign political and religious influence and representing himself as a simple country doctor to whom the humble, noirist values of the peasant class – voudou in particular – were sacrosanct.⁸

This had a binary effect on Haiti: on a spiritual level, Duvalier’s sartorial invocation of Baron Samedi conveyed his power over the lives and deaths of the Haitian population; his entitlement to respect and sacrifice; and his paternal role as provider and protector of Haiti. On a socio-political level, it communicated his backing of the populist, folk agenda and willingness to shepherd the neglected majority; to celebrate black culture; and to shelter Haiti from foreign powers who had done nothing – in the minds of the Haitian people – but exploit the island’s resources and repress its religion.

But Duvalier’s built persona took on such an outsized grandeur that the division between real and magical thinking in Haiti dissolved, and discourse surrounding his presidency – which was often seeded to the people by Duvalier himself – served not only to perpetuate his personal mythology, but to obscure the far more macabre realities of his reign. Rumours circulated in Port-au-Prince that Duvalier took baths wearing nothing but the top hat of Baron Samedi; that he stored a severed head in his chambers  with which to commune with spirits of the dead, that he studied the entrails of a goat to predict his future and that his wife and daughter were trained mediums.⁹ It was said that he had journeyed to Trou Foban, a mountain cave outside Port-au-Prince, where he and a houngan lured spirits of evil back to the palace and trapped them in an otherwise empty room.¹⁰

In reality, Duvalier was responsible for tens of thousands of deaths and disappearances and used terror and torture as implements of personal redress. He kept a private torture room – painted rust-red to hide splattered blood – with holes drilled in the wall so that he could watch from the comfort of one of his adjoining chambers.¹¹ His personal guard, the Corps des Volontaires de Sécurité Nacionale, would nightly replenish the stock of prisoners. Commonly known as the tonton makoutes – Creole for bogiemen or zombies – makoutes had previously been a fixture in voudou parables about misbehaved children, whom they were said to kidnap at night. Duvalier’s personal cache of makoutes was responsible for several thousand executions per month.¹² Like their commander, their attire was tuned to ignite both nationalistic pride and sheer terror in the Haitian people.

Initially their symbolic zombification was limited to the dark sunglasses they wore at all hours to replicate images of the dark-eyed, nightprowling zombies in voudou mythology. Later, they took to wearing farm labourer’s dark denim, with wide-brimmed felt cowboy hats and red scarves in the style formerly worn by peasant guerilla caco fighters.¹³ These costumes mirrored the duality of coded information invoked by Duvalier’s Samedi wardrobe. With their sunglasses, they forged a visual link between themselves and the spirit world. But with their red scarves and denim, the makoutes aligned themselves with Haiti’s anti-colonialist revolutionary legacy; the cumulative effect was to position the makoutes outside and above the hegemonic order of political and social life. Duvalier, too, used the clothing and accoutrements of voudou iconography to mitigate the social backlash against his grab for power, and to align himself – however hypocritically – with the Haitian people. In effecting the persona of Samedi, Duvalier replaced himself as the axis between the two planes of existence – living and spirit – becoming, in the minds of his constituents, a living god.

Julie Cirelli is a New York-born, Copenhagen-based writer and the current editor of Kinfolk.

All images from ‘Divine Horsemen – The Living Gods of Haiti,’ (1985) filmed 1947-1954 by Maya Deren. Courtesy Microcinema International.

This article was originally published in Vestoj On Fashion and Magic.

1. T Adorno, ‘Theses Against Occultism,’ Minima Moralia: Reflections from Damaged Life, Verso, 1998, pp. 238-243. ↩

2. P C Johnson, ‘Secretism and the Apotheosis of Duvalier,’ Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 74 (2), 2006, pp. 420-445. ↩

3. M Deren, Divine Horsemen: The Living Gods of Haiti, 60 minutes, Microcinema, 1985. ↩

4. Ibid. ↩

5. Ibid. ↩

6. C Boyce Davies (ed), Encyclopedia of the African Diaspora, Volume 1, ABC-CLIO, 2008, pp. 821. Over the course of his reign, Duvalier metamorphosed into Samedi in manner and mien, deliberately donning the voudou loa’s signature accoutrements – top hat and long, black coat, thick glasses and gold-handled cane – and effecting Samedi’s slow movements and high-pitched nasal intonation. ((B Diederich & A Burt, Papa Doc: The Truth About Haiti Today, McGraw-Hill, New York, 1969, p. 354. ↩

7. Ibid, pp. 47 ↩

8. P C Johnson, ‘Secretism and the Apotheosis of Duvalier,’ Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 74 (2), 2006, pp. 420-445. ↩

9. B Diederich & A Burt, Papa Doc: The Truth About Haiti Today, McGraw-Hill, New York, 1969, p. 355. ↩

10. E Abbott, Haiti: the Duvaliers and Their Legacy, Simon and Schuster, New York, 1991, pp. 82. ↩

11. Ibid, pp. 133. ↩

12. R F Wagner Jr, ‘The Duvalier Regime,’ The Harvard Crimson, June 3, 1963. ↩

13. E Abbott, Haiti: the Duvaliers and Their Legacy, Simon and Schuster, New York, 1991, p. 86. ↩