The purpose of this thread is to explore the old belief that the devil and demons were the color black.

I'm interested in any recollections people may have of any supersitions, proverbs, folk songs, or children's rhymes, and children's games that refer to the devil, demons, witches being black (with no disrespect intended for those who are Wicca).

I'm also interested in any references to religious songs,folk songs, proverbs, or children's rhymes of the color white being good (pure) and black being evil (impure).

The impetus for my [current] research of this subject is a 2008 query that I found last night on an anti-rascist parents blog. The query was from an American mother living in Germany who requested information about a German children's game similar to tag called "Who's Afraid Of The Black Man". I'll post that query in my next post to this thread, and explain how that query led me to this subject.

I'll also provide a number of hyperlinks and excerpts from online sources that I have found on this subject. And of course, I hope that others will also do so.

By the way, I used Mudcat's search engine to try to identify any previous discussion thread on this subject, but didn't find any. If there is such a thread (or threads, or posts withing others threads) I would appreciate someone identifying them.

Thanks in advance for your participation in this thread.