Dragon's Blood - A Powerful Grimoire Spell for Amazing Magical Ability

Blood from Dragons?

Dragon’s blood resin is a vibrant red substance that has captivated cultures for centuries due to its striking color and wide range of uses. Contrary to its mythical sounding name, dragon’s blood does not come from dragons but from various species of plants, such as calamus draco and dracaena cinnabari. These plants are typically found in tropical and subtropical regions, such as Southeast Asia, Africa, and parts of South America. The resin is harvested by making small incisions in the bark or stems of these plants, allowing the sap to flow and harden into resin.

Each plant genus produces a slightly different variety of dragon’s blood with unique characteristics. The Dracaena cinnabari tree, found on the island of Socotra off the coast of Yemen, produces one of the most famous varieties, known for its use in ancient rituals, medicine, and art. The process of harvesting and processing the resin is often labor-intensive, requiring careful extraction to maintain the health of the plant and ensure a sustainable yield.

Dragon's Blood Ink

In 2011 I had the opportunity to work, for the first time, with dragon's blood ink. Now, I typically practice in the hoodoo tradition, where fancy magickal inks aren't really used (being told to use red, blue or black ink is traditionally as complicated as it gets.) But, on this occasion I was doing a spell from The Black Pullet and while it didn't specify to use any particular kind of ink, it seemed like the appropriate place to try one out.

Now, it may come as no surprise that "dragon's blood" does not come from a dragon. Rather, it's the name of a resin that has a reddish color. Presumably it was thought at one time to come from dragons; or perhaps the plant in former times had a name that sounded similar to "dragon" and was corrupted by folk etymology.

I mixed the ink by myself from the genuine resin, and laid it down with a brush instead of a pen. I was surprised that the ink came out a rather brownish color, rather than the red tone dragon's blood appears to have when pulverized, and that fake dragon's blood talismans are usually printed in (I had always assumed they at least were attempting to match the hue of the real thing.)

Here is the recipe for dragon's blood ink which I used:

2 parts dragon's blood resin
1 part gum arabic
17 parts alcohol (pure -- use Everclear or 100% rubbing alcohol)

Finely powder the resins and combine thoroughly with the alcohol. You may need to let the mixture sit a while for the resins to properly blend into the alcohol, before it is ready.

This stuff dries out fairly fast, or at least it did when I made a tiny batch like I did. I think most commercial Dragon's Blood formulas have some water mixed in to keep down the evaporation, and I suppose you could do that here (though you'd probably want to do it AFTER it's blended into the alcohol.)

Alternately, you can just let the mixture dry out like I did, and save the leftover resin powder for a batch of Agrippa's Sun incense.

Dragon's Blood Incense

Dragon's blood resin can be burnt by itself as an incense mixture. However, it doesn't have much of a fragrance on its own; though it will smoke plenty, and scent isn't necessarily the way that magical properties are conveyed in the traditional practices that use incense. I would call the smell of true dragon's blood resin "plastic-like" -- not a smell of burning plastic, but that faint odor that clings to an item made of plastic.

If you are burning dragon's blood incense which has a strong perfume to it, it is either adulterated or is a fake fragrance blend. Many incense brands sell alleged "Dragon's Blood" incense which contains none of the real resin and is just an artificial fragrance mixture chosen by the company. Some incense makers don't even realize that it's a true herbal ingredient, and sell it just a a suggestive name like "Angel Wings" or "Mystic Nights."

In hoodoo magical practices, dragon's blood is admired for its red color, which is used in spells of power, love, protection and sometimes uncrossing. It's also used to bring back a lost lover, on the word play of dragging (dragon) the person back into the relationship. For this reason it pairs well as an incense with Intranquility Spells and rituals of the type.

Paper-in-Shoe Spells

A popular and very traditional hoodoo spell, often used for any situation where you need to control someone with magic , is the namepaper-in-shoe spell. It's very easy: you write the target's name 3, 7, or 9 times on a paper (depending on intent and who's giving instruction) then fold it up, sometimes after dressing it with oils or powders, then put it in your shoe. This "keeps the person underfoot" or "stomps out the trouble" or any other number of metaphors. I had this work several times over the years. In one instance, I was working for a very unpleasant boss, on a short-term job. It was the last day, and I only had about 3 hours of work left on the project; and I wanted him to up my pay for the day since it almost wasn't worth the trip across town for the amount he was paying me, for only 3 hours. He was very reluctant. So I wrote his name 3 times on a 5-dollar bill he'd given me, and dusted it with Bend Over powder. He paid me what I ...

Spiritual Use of Turpentine in Hoodoo and Witchcraft

I have posted in the past about the use of giving one's bedding a spiritual cleansing from time to time. I recently was laundering my pillows in the same load of laundry as some turpentine-soaked rags, with the result that the pillows emerged from the wash reeking of turpentine. From a magical perspective, this may not be a bad thing. Turpentine is used in old-time hoodoo rituals for purposes such as uncrossing, protection and sometimes as a feed for mojo bags. Its solvent powers and strong odor do indeed suggest a powerful spiritual cleansing agent, and it is still used in some modern day cleaning products on a purely practical level for these same reasons. Old time medicines sometimes included turpentine as a thing to drink, in small doses. A book from the 1850s, The Domestic Medicine Chest , recommends giving it to children in a dose of one teaspoon for killing tapeworm. Relatedly, in old time hoodoo cures for "live things" turpentine might be made into a tea...

Ammonia - A Spiritual Cleansing Agent for Magick

Ammonia is a strong cleansing agent in hoodoo magick, both physically and spiritually. In Edwardian times it was advised as an old home remedy for a nerve tonic (see recipe below.) "Household ammonia" or "ammonium hydroxide" is a solution of NH3 in water. Household ammonia ranges in concentration from 5 to 10 weight percent ammonia. The Romans called the ammonium chloride deposits they collected from near the Temple of Amun (Greek Ἄμμων Ammon) in ancient Libya 'sal ammoniacus' (salt of Amun) because of proximity to the nearby temple of Amun, the chief god of ancient Thebes. Salts of ammonia have been known from very early times; thus the term Hammoniacus sal appears in the writings of Pliny, although it is not known whether the term is identical with the more modern sal-ammoniac (ammonium chloride). In the form of sal-ammoniac (nushadir) ammonia was important to the Muslim alchemists as early as the 8th century, first mentioned by the arab chemist...

The Intranquil Spirit

(EDIT: Up to date information about the Intranquil Sprit can be found in my book The Intranquil Spirit , available on Amazon. This post has some incomplete information which is clarified in the book.) The Intranquility spell is, unfortunately, the first resort of many a rejected lover. In some ways it makes sense -- the more unhappy and forlorn one is about a breakup, the better this idea of making the other partner feel just as much so starts to sound. Unfortunately, this spell is often not well suited to a case. The purpose of the standard Intranquility spell is to have the person be tormented by the spirit until they make contact with you, or whomever the spell is being cast for. This means that if a person is already in good contact with their ex OR if they're one of those people who cannot restrain themselves from initiating contact, then this already is probably not the right spell for that case. If you've had an Intranquility spell cast and you make contac...

13 Herb Bath for Curse Removal

13 Herb Bath for curse removal can be made from from any 13 uncrossing and purification herbs. For example, if I needed to fix a batch of 13 herb bath right now based on what I've got in the house, I could mix bay leaves, rue, mint, rosemary, wood betony, sage, verbena, angelica root, white rose petals, lemongrass, lemon peel, agrimony and arnica, and it would suffice well. Other herbs like hyssop, pine needles, juniper leaves, boldo, eucalyptus leaves, mullein, basil, lavender, or marshmallow leaves would be good to use too. By no means complete, here is a list of just a few herbs said to remove a curse or jinx that you can use to make your own 13 Herbs bath: Agrimony Alkanet Angelica Arnica Basil Bay leaves Black Pepper Blessed Thistle Boldo Cayenne Pepper Chives Eucalyptus Garlic Hyssop John the Conqueror Juniper Lavender Lemon Lemongrass Lime Marshmallow leaves Mint Mullein Onion Pine Rosemary Rue Sage Sandalwood Verbena White Rose Petals ...

The Spellcaster's Source Hoodoo and Voodoo Witchcraft Blog of Talia Felix

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