the Manchu progenitor, to the horse deity, and various other spirits”15. Yet no amount of divination could have prepared Emperor Hungli for 1768, the year Beijing switched from religious harmony to religious divide.
Two reports of ‘queue-cutting’; the long braid that Chinese men sported during the reign of the Qing Dynasty, was the catalyst for panic in the city. To have it cut off was equivalent to losing a part of the soul, as it was “said to possess a certain biodynamic force”16. The Pekinese believed that, “by enchanting either the written name of the victim or a piece of his hair, [a] sorcerer [could] cause him to sicken and die. He then [could] use the stolen soul-force for his own purposes”17. Most of the stories (of which there weren’t many) reported queues of Han Chinese being cut, which is what led to such frenzy. They believed they were being targeted by
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However, it’s rare that such a transformation happens in a matter of years. In eighteenth century New Orleans, the French made efforts to convert their slaves to Catholicism, but the Voodooists would not let the religion of their ancestors die out. They continued to practice Voodoo in the guise of Christianity, creating a type of 'creole’ religion that, today, is commonly referred to as New Orleans Voodoo. However, the slaves convinced their owners that they had fully converted by changing the names of their deities to those of Catholic saints, and further laced Voodoo with Roman Catholic influences by introducing statues of saints, prayer, and holy water to their practice20. Owners, seeing their slaves praying to a saint they were familiar with, were satisfied. In this manner, “camouflaged as European saints, the [Voodoo] divinities continued to be invoked, fed, and celebrated by their transplanted New World devotees, who in turn expected protection and assistance from their ancient spiritual