160 pages – 8 illustrations- 16 tables
Language: Italian

Until it is penetrated by the light of reason, mystery ignites the imagination with a thousand facets, each of which contains a part of the truth, but which, however, cannot give a complete picture of it. This is what happens with Vaudou, which despite having been treated in many texts still remains a dark and mysterious reality. Born within the black continent, and more precisely in the territories located on the Gulf of Guinea, and transferred – aboard the slave ships – particularly to Haiti and Brazil, it is formed above all by ancient rituals to which divinities and Western-style religious elements. This book allows you to enter the mentality and penetrate the secrets of Vaudou religiosity through a detailed explanation of the rites, divinities and entities that intervene and act in the magical-religious manifestations of Vaudou. The rituals are essentially carried out with the use of fetishes or images that impersonate the numerous entities of the Vaudou Pantheon, and through their intermediaries, since their manifestations take place through priests and priestesses who fall into a trance. In addition to the various rituals based on offerings and sacrifices of animals, as well as dances that lead to mystical ecstasy, the so-called zombies or “living dead” enjoy a particular reputation, to which through certain rituals an almost vegetative form of life can be returned , which makes them slaves without their own will. The author, who has lived for a long time in the places where Vaudou occurs, makes an in-depth study of it, examining numerous episodes that really took place.