I was very interested in Ron May's comments via Wales on house charms.  We
manage an 1855-56 plantation house and recently noticed that there is a flat
iron (minus handle) and a piece of ornamental iron (possibly from a
fireplace tool holder) imbedded in the interior floor of one of the
fireplaces.  Based on construction, this appears to be an original fireplace
with no later modifications (some in the house have been relined).  The iron
pieces are fairly carefully laid in the plaster surface to be flush with the
rest of the surface.  Are we perhaps looking at a house charm? And since the
house was certainly slave-built (this is the deep South!), perhaps an
Africanism?  Maybe it worked on this house since it survived intact and
unchanged to today, even with almost 50 years of being unoccupied.

What a fun topic to think about and look for in old buildings!

                        Lucy Wayne