Before a baby goes to a christening, before the relatives arrive, before the first public outing where strangers will lean in and say "¡qué precioso!" — the azabache goes on. This small black charm, usually carved into the shape of a figa (a clenched fist with the thumb tucked between the fingers) and pinned to clothing or fastened on a bracelet or necklace, is one of the most durable protection traditions in Latino culture. If you were born into a Latino family, there is a reasonable chance one of these was pinned to your clothes before you could walk.
What Is an Azabache?
An azabache is a protection amulet made from jet — a dense, matte black gemstone (technically a mineraloid formed from fossilized wood under pressure) — traditionally carved into the shape of a figa hand or, in some versions, a closed fist. The word azabache comes from Arabic (al-sabbāj), reflecting the Moorish cultural presence in medieval Spain. Jet from Asturias in northern Spain, mined for centuries near the pilgrimage city of Santiago de Compostela, has been used for protective purposes since at least the Roman period, and the belief in its protective power traveled to Latin America with Spanish colonizers.
Today, azabaches sold in the Americas are often made from black glass, resin, or other materials rather than genuine jet, but the form and function remain the same. Smithsonian Magazine has documented the use of protective amulets in Latino folk medicine traditions as part of a broader record of cultural continuity across diaspora communities.
The Figa Shape and What It Means
The figa (also called higa in Spanish) is an ancient protective hand gesture — a closed fist with the thumb tucked between the index and middle fingers — that dates back thousands of years in Mediterranean and West African cultures. In the context of the evil eye tradition, the gesture was believed to ward off the harmful gaze of envy. When the gesture was carved into a small pendant, the protection became portable and wearable.
The figa arrived in Latin America through both Spanish colonization and the African diaspora: the gesture appears in Yoruba-derived religious traditions as well as in Spanish folk culture. In Brazil, where it's called figa, it appears on everything from amulets to large public sculptures. In Spanish-speaking Latin America, it's inseparable from the evil eye protection tradition and from the practice of protecting babies specifically.
Babies and the Azabache
The protection of newborns from the evil eye is the most common use of the azabache. In many Latino families, the azabache is pinned to the baby's undershirt — never outerwear that might come off — on the day the baby goes home from the hospital or before any public gathering where strangers will see and admire the child. The logic connects directly to the mal de ojo tradition: admiration from strangers, especially if they don't touch the baby after looking, can carry harmful energy. The azabache intercepts it.
When an azabache breaks or goes missing, families typically don't treat it as bad luck — they treat it as confirmation that it absorbed something it was supposed to absorb. It did its job. You get another one.
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