Methods of Divination

Oneiromancy – What is it?

“When the sleeper is temporarily in the primeval ocean of Nun, and he awakens in a dream, he finds himself within the confines of the farworld, and able to interact with the other inhabitants.”
~ Ancient Egyptian Text

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Oneiromancy is a form of divination based upon dreams; it is a system of dream interpretation that uses dreams to predict the future. Carl Jung later focused this idea and formed theories, experiments, and terminology around oneiromancy.

Dream divination has been with us for as long as humans have been dreaming. Here are just a few examples:

  • Dating from the Third Dynasty of Ur (circa 2100 BC), the Epic of Gilgamesh is often regarded as the earliest surviving great work of literature. This book reflects heavily on the belief that our ancients looked to our dreams to predict, roughly, our future, by his persistence to sleep on things and gather information from his dreams before making decisions.
  • A unique example of a book of dream-interpretation survives from pre-Hellenistic Egypt, the  “Ramesside Dream-Book.” Copied under the reign of Ramses IIthe surviving fragments were collected and translated into English by Kasia Szpakowska.
  • Dreams occur throughout the Bible as omens or messages from God
  • Dream divination was a common feature of Greek and Roman religion and literature of all genres. Aristotle and Plato discuss dreams in various works. The only surviving Greco-Roman dreambook, the Oneirocritica was written by Artemidorus.  He suggests that dreams are unique to the individual, and that a person’s waking life will affect the symbols in his dreams. He shows awareness of the dreaming mind’s capacity to use metaphors in its messages.
  • In the Arabic tradition, dreams about specific numbers or about reading specific chapters of the Qurʼan are among the chief subjects of prognostication. The most renowned of the Arabic texts of oneiromancy is the Great Book of Interpretation of Dreams.

Alphabetical Divination – What is it?

mao-tipografia-tirada-no-estilo-ornamental_23-2147514074Books are formed from words. Words are formed from letters. One school of the Kabbalah suggests that the Creator formed the entire world from Hebrew letters. Individual letters, of any alphabet, can be used to provide an oracle.

The basic idea is to write the letters of the alphabet either on pieces of paper, or on some other surface. The letters are then randomly chosen through various means, and the message received is deciphered.

A very simple way to do this is as follows:

  • Write the letters of the alphabet, several times each, on individual squares of paper.
  • Place all pieces inside a jar, ideally one with a tightly fitting cover.
  • Shake them up and spill the letters on the floor or a table.
  • Look for spontaneously created words to answer your question.

Source: Element Encyclopedia of 5000 Spells

Alectryomancy – What is it?

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Alectryomancy (also called alectoromancy or alectromancy) is a form of divination in which the diviner observes a bird, several birds, or most preferably a white rooster or cockerel pecking at grain (such as wheat) that the diviner has scattered on the ground. The observer may place grain in the shape of letters and thus discern a divinatory revelation by noting which letters the birds peck at, or the diviner may just interpret the pattern left by the birds’ pecking in randomly scattered grain.

In ancient Rome, fhis practice was used when the sun or the moon was in Aries or Leo. A circle of letters (originally twenty-four in number, since j, v are the same as i, u) was traced on the ground and laid out with some sort of grain placed on each letter. Next a rooster, usually a white one, was allowed to peck at the grains, thus selecting letters to create a divinatory message or sign. The chosen letters could be either read in order of selection, or rearranged to make an anagram. Sometimes readers got 2 or 3 letters and interpreted them.

In another version, the observer tethers the bird in the center of a circle, around the perimeter of which is marked the alphabet, with a piece of grain at each letter. For each grain the bird pecks, the observer writes down the letter which that grain represents. The observer also replaces each grain as the bird eats it, so that letters may be repeated. The sequence of letters recorded will presumably contain a message.

In Africa, a black hen or a gamecock is used, which within such a religious practice and belief “to foresee, to be inspired by a god” may be accurately referred to as a sacred cock or sacred vessel. An African diviner sprinkles grain on the ground and when the bird has finished eating, the seer interprets the designs or patterns left on the ground.

Another method of alectormancy, used less often, was based on reciting letters of the alphabet noting those at which a cock crows. Letters were recorded in sequence and then these letters were interpreted as the answer to the question chosen by seers.

A rare, obsolete meaning of alectormancy is “a divination by a cock-stone”. A cock-stone or alectoria was “a christall coloured stone (as big as a beane) found in the gyzerne, or maw of some cockes” (Cotgrave). These stones, purportedly found in a roosters crop, were known to the Romans and were imputed with magical powers. Apparently, they were used for some sort of lithomantic divination, though the details of this use are not to be found.

Alectormancy was also used in Ancient Rome to identify thieves.

Source: Wikipedia

Aichmomancy – What is it?

6e74d15221989b408dd50ff514216debAichmomancy is a form of divination somewhat similar to Acultomancy in that it uses sharp pointed objects to show patterns to read.

Aichmomancy readers use pins, knives, forks, nails, and handmade pieces of wood sharpened to a point. Readers drop sharp pointed objects onto a flat surface, find patterns and interpret them.

In the most ancient form of this divination a spearhead was spun in the sand. Several centuries later, during the Early Middle Ages, divinations with pins became popular in Europe. Readers used seven pins and a table covered with cloth. Pins were thrown over the table, and the patterns were read and interpreted.

According to the article in wikipedia, what follows are the basic patterns and their interpretations:

1 – Love 5 – Danger 9 – Honesty 13 – Sickness 17 – Pleasure 21 – Break-up
2 – Money 6 – Quarrel 10 – Rudeness 14 – Wedding 18 – Encounter 22 – Health
3 – Gift 7 – Prison 11 – Joy 15 – Birth 19 – Meeting 23 – Vanity
4 – Grief 8 – Engagement 12 – Letter 16 – Resistance 20 – Success 24 – Road

I am not clear as to what those particular numbers refer to, and so far my research has yielded no results. I do, however, believe that any magickal square, or any other “map” could be used, as long as you are clear as to what the various areas on the map mean to you. For example, you could use a Feng Sui square to drop your pins on, and then interpret the meanings based on where and they land.

lo-shu-square

Collected from  wikipedia and various other sources.

Acultomancy – What is it?

Acultphillips_sharp_05omancy is a form of divination that uses needles for readings.

Using needles comes from the olden days where Romani peoples used to read people and use needles as their pointers. Readers use seven needles or up to twenty one needles in a somewhat shallow bowl with water in it.

Needles may also be dropped onto a flat surface that has been coated with powder or flour. Readers then look for the designs that the needles make in the substance.

Some of the main designs are lines. They may be broken, parallel, vertical, or horizontal in some fashion. The broken line may mean traveling or heading on a new journey. The parallel lines may mean money in the future, either given or taken away. The vertical lines are meant as guided roads to take. The horizontal lines may mean what the fate will be.

There is another type of acultomancy and that is called acutomancy. This practice uses sharp objects or anything that is pointed. Seven are dropped onto a table and the pattern is distinguished and read. Another practice along with this one is Acutomanzia. Acutomanzia employs thirteen pins. Ten must be straight and three are bent at an angle. They are also dropped into flour or powder of some sort to discern patterns.

Some Cherokee shamans used two needles afloat in a small creek-side pothole or bowl of water. Depending on how the needles drifted apart or together, a diagnosis was determined.

Sources: Wikipedia and Divination and Healing

Abocomancy – What is it?

dust-articleinlineAbacomancy, also known as Amathomancy (from the Greek word “amathos” meaning sand) a form of divination based on the interpretation of the patterns in dust, dirt, silt, sand, or the ashes of the recently deceased. Reading the patterns is believed to give some insight into the future.

Readers drop the dirt, sand, or ashes on a flat surface and start looking for a pattern that may represent symbols or pictures. They interpret these symbols and pictures to what is going to happen in the future. Some look for certain symbols that are seen over and over.

Jackson Pollock, renowned painter, was famous for his series of paintings on abacomancy, which focused on the patterns in the paintings he made to foretell the future.

Source: Wikipedia

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