Hand of Glory: Myths and Origins

What follows is an adaptation of the transcript of my Hand of Glory talk, edited for the written page.

The Hand of Glory has shown up several times in a modern popular mythology. You may have seen it make an appearance in movies like The Wicker Man and the show Lost Girl.

One of the classic stories illustrating one of the uses of a Hand of Glory goes as follows: the owners of an inn let in a wayfaring old man. Everyone else in the inn goes to sleep except the maid, who witnesses the man light the fingers of a severed dried hand. However, one of the fingers will not light. When the man goes to call on his band of outlaws, the maid shoves him out and bars the door. She is unable to rouse anyone in the house, so she attempts to put out the lighted hand-candle. After water and ale fail to do so, she succeeds with milk. The rest of the inn rouses, and drive off the thieves. There are other versions in which the thieves are caught and hung.

How do you make your very own Hand of Glory? You find a criminal who has been hung for his crimes while he is still on the gallows. At midnight on a moonless night you cut off his right hand. It's definitely his right hand. Unless you read a different story, then it's his left hand. If he's a murderer, cut off the

hand that did the deed. Well, ok… you cut off A HAND. And of course you do it in the darkness of night; you'll be caught and stopped if you're doing this in broad daylight. Magic spells sometime eerily align with logic.

Next you wrap it with a burial shroud and squeeze to drain the blood. Any old burial shroud will do.

Powder it in earthenware with saltpetre, salt & long pepper for a fortnight or until dry. Then expose it to the sun in the dog-days, or if inconvenient, heat in an oven with vervain and fern. (Microwave is not recommended, as it makes it chewy.)

Next, make it into a candle by either dipping the hand in virgin wax or fat from the dead man and sesame oil. Throw in a little horse dung for good measure, and you have it: your very own hand of glory. Alternatively, you can use the wax to make a candle and place it in the hand instead. Some older versions have the Thieves' Light as the finger of an unbaptized (and often unborn) infant, or the arm of a child.