Cinquefoil

Cinquefoil (Potentilla spp., particularly Potentilla reptans and related species), known in American folk magick as five finger grass, is among the most widely employed herbs for luck, money drawing, legal protection, and general blessing. The plant’s five-part leaves have made it a symbol of five-fold fortune across European and American folk traditions for centuries.

The name cinquefoil comes from the Old French for “five leaves,” and the plant has accumulated a remarkable breadth of applications precisely because the number five carries such symbolic weight in Western esoteric thought, from the five elements of the classical system to the five points of the pentagram.

History and origins

Cinquefoil appears in European folk magick from at least the medieval period. It was hung in doorways and over hearths as a protective herb in British and Continental practice, and its presence in collections of folk remedies and charm-books suggests widespread, long-standing use. The plant grows readily across temperate regions of Europe, Asia, and North America, which contributed to its broad distribution across folk traditions.

In American Hoodoo and Southern folk practice, cinquefoil under the name five finger grass became a cornerstone herb. Its popularity in this tradition is documented in the early twentieth century collections of folklorists such as Harry Middleton Hyatt, who recorded its use in multiple states for luck, money, and court case work. The five-fold blessing attribution, in which each leaf represents one of the five classic desires, appears to be well established within African American folk tradition by that period.

European cunning craft traditions also employed cinquefoil, sometimes under the older name potentilla, for protection, invisibility, and as an ingredient in flying ointments in historical texts, though such references should be understood as part of folk herbalism and not taken as instructions for replication.

Magickal uses

Cinquefoil’s primary domains are money and luck, court and legal matters, and general blessing. Secondary uses include dream enhancement (sleeping with the herb under the pillow is said to make significant dreams more vivid), love drawing, and mild protective work.

For court case work, cinquefoil is carried to any legal proceeding. Many practitioners wash their hands with a tea made from the herb before entering a courthouse, and some write their name on a small piece of paper, fold it around a pinch of cinquefoil, and carry this paper in a shoe throughout the proceedings. The herb is said to give the practitioner a persuasive voice and a favorable impression.

For prosperity work, cinquefoil is combined with lodestone, pyrite, and bayberry in money-drawing sachets. The herb can also be used to dress green candles: anoint the candle with a prosperity oil, then roll it through dried cinquefoil before burning.

How to work with it

A five-fold blessing sachet is one of the most traditional uses. Take five leaves of dried cinquefoil or a generous pinch of the dried herb and place them in a yellow or gold cloth. Add a coin, a small tiger’s eye or citrine chip, and a slip of paper on which you have written the five things you are drawing toward you: love, money, health, power, and wisdom. Tie the sachet closed and carry it on your person, feeding it with a drop of bergamot or cinnamon oil once a week.

A court case floor wash can be made by simmering a handful of dried cinquefoil in a quart of water for fifteen minutes, cooling, straining, and adding a small amount of the resulting tea to a bucket of wash water. Wash the floors of your home moving toward the front door the night before any legal matter, pulling the wash water out the door and disposing of it away from your home.

For a simple luck charm, carry a single dried five-finger sprig in your wallet alongside your money, replacing it each new moon.

In myth and popular culture

Cinquefoil appears in European folk tradition from at least the medieval period under several names, including potentilla, five-leaf grass, and silverweed. Its presence in continental witchcraft literature as an ingredient in flying ointments, recorded in demonological texts that catalogued supposed witch practices, gave it a dramatic literary reputation that its actual folk use does not fully support. The association with flying ointments in historical texts such as those compiled by demonologist Johann Weyer reflects the period’s tendency to collect and amplify stories of witch practice, and the specific recipe attributions in these texts are of uncertain reliability.

In Hoodoo and African American folk tradition, the documentation of five finger grass by the folklorist Harry Middleton Hyatt in his multi-volume “Hoodoo, Conjuration, Witchcraft, Rootwork” (published 1970-1978, drawing on interviews from the 1930s and 1940s) provides the most substantial empirical record of the herb’s use. Hyatt’s work preserved dozens of specific formulas and testimonies describing its use in luck, court case, and money-drawing work, giving it a more thoroughly documented American folk history than many better-known plants.

The symbolic weight of the number five in Western esotericism, encompassing the five elements, the five points of the pentagram, and the five senses, has made cinquefoil’s five-lobed leaf particularly resonant in systems that work with pentagrammatic symbolism. The plant has occasionally been depicted growing around pentagram imagery in nineteenth and twentieth century occult illustration, though this is an artistic association rather than a documented historical practice.

Myths and facts

Several misunderstandings about cinquefoil in magickal practice are worth addressing.

• Cinquefoil is sometimes described as a universally agreed-upon ingredient in historical flying ointments. The historical texts that list it in this context are demonological compilations that should be treated critically; they describe what inquisitors and demonologists claimed witches used, not necessarily what practitioners actually employed. Cinquefoil has no known psychoactive properties.
• Some practitioners assume cinquefoil is rare or difficult to obtain. Several species in the Potentilla genus grow widely across temperate regions of North America, Europe, and Asia as common wild plants, and the dried herb is available from most herb suppliers. It is among the more accessible folk herbs.
• The five blessings attributed to the five leaves, love, money, health, power, and wisdom, are a specific folk attribution from Hoodoo tradition and should not be projected onto European folk uses, where the herb’s applications were somewhat different in emphasis.
• Cinquefoil and silverweed are sometimes treated as identical. Silverweed (Potentilla anserina) is one member of the Potentilla genus and shares the general family’s properties, but the name cinquefoil or five finger grass is most often applied to Potentilla reptans or Potentilla canadensis in folk magick contexts.
• Many practitioners assume cinquefoil is only for money and court cases. The herb has a broader range of folk applications including dream enhancement, love drawing, and general blessing, and its correspondence with Jupiter makes it suitable for any working aimed at expansion and good fortune.