The Jet Figa: the story of the amulet against the evil eye

What did mothers hide in their children's clothes?

There was a time when something frightened people more than the dark. It was the evil eye.

You couldn't see it. It made no sound. Yet for centuries many people believed that a glance full of envy could bring illness, misfortune or bad luck. And the ones they worried about most were always the little ones.

So, before leaving the house, many mothers repeated the same gesture. They checked that a small black hand was still tucked away in their child's clothes.

It was a jet figa. It wasn't an ornament. It was a promise of protection.

That gesture — a closed hand with the thumb peeking out between the index and middle fingers — is ancient. The Romans already made it and called it manus fica: a gesture to defy evil and ward off envy. "Your gaze can't reach me."

Centuries later, in the Middle Ages, the symbol found its home in the north of Spain, in Asturias and Galicia. In Santiago de Compostela, near the jet mines, master craftsmen began carving the figa from that black stone, long believed to hold powerful protective properties. From then on it travelled with pilgrims on the Way of St James, protected generations of children and passed from hand to hand like a small family treasure.

Many more centuries have gone by. Today we know that no glance can make a child ill. But envy still exists. And the symbol of the figa has lasted to this day.

Because beliefs change. But some symbols remain.

Perhaps that's why the jet figa still accompanies so many people, generation after generation.

Make one of the oldest traditions in our history your own.

And if you would like to bring this gesture into your rituals, you will also find it as a candle.

Jet Figa Pendant →
A small black hand. Like the ones mothers used to hide.

Figa Fist Candle →
The same protective gesture, as a candle.