As with the South Asian bhoot, Jamaican tradition subdivides the general duppy category into named, specific figures rather than treating every ghost as identical, the best known being Rolling Calf, a fire-eyed, chain-dragging spirit associated with wrongdoing in life, particularly with dishonest butchers and overseers, and River Mumma, a guardian spirit of rivers and springs whose favour or anger affects the water supply and who is treated with genuine respect rather than only fear.
Practices for managing duppies, including the use of specific plants, salt at thresholds, and folk specialists sometimes called obeah practitioners who could be consulted to identify or manage a troubling spirit, sit within a broader Jamaican folk-religious landscape that blends African-derived belief, European folk Christianity, and locally developed practice into a distinct Caribbean synthesis. Encyclopedic treatment of Caribbean and diaspora religion generally situates duppy belief alongside related concepts across the wider Black Atlantic, including Haitian ideas about the soul and spirit found in Vodou, as parallel regional developments from shared African cosmological roots rather than a single exported system.