pishogue means Magic, witchcraft; a spell, especially one designed to cause or cure illnesses to man or beast, or to increase or decrease the quantities of farm products such as butter or milk. Lexicurio rates it Distinctive — a strength score of 68 out of 100.
Why this word is great
PISHOGUE — [Noun] A charm or spell of folk magic, specifically one employed to influence matters of health, fertility, or agricultural yield. From Anglo-Irish, from Irish piseog ("witchcraft, charm"), from Middle Irish piseóc, pisóc. Unlike "incantation," which suggests a formal ritual utterance, or "hex," which implies a spell of pure malevolence, a pishogue is a pragmatic, often ambivalent transaction with the unseen. It is the egg buried at the boundary to bless a field, the muttered words over a cup of well-water to break a fever, or the rowan twigs woven above a stable door to turn ill luck—a quiet, earth-stained manipulation of forces where every remedy contains the ghost of a curse.
noun
- Magic, witchcraft; a spell, especially one designed to cause or cure illnesses to man or beast, or to increase or decrease the quantities of farm products such as butter or milk.“Pishog: A mystic rite, by which one person is enabled to make a supernatural transfer of his neighbour's butter into his own churns.”