Hopefully not that ominous – Ten of Swords, Rider-Waite Tarot illustrated by Pamela Colman Smith

(8) CRYPTOMANCY

It’s an omen!

According to Wikipedia’s list of methods of divination, cryptomancy is divination by omens, although the prefix crypto- designates hidden or secret, as in hidden or secret signs. Which begs one of the biggest questions for this method of divination – what is an omen?

And there’s the rub. The problem with this as a distinct method of divination is that most, if not all, methods of divination ultimately relied on what might be described as divining or interpreting omens from whatever it was they looked at for their subject matter.

Augury, for example, often used as a synonym for omen, originates in interpreting omens from the behaviour or flight of birds – or ornithomancy, as we saw in theriomancy. And so on.

Accordingly, omens can be somewhat mundane, but I prefer my omens to be portentous – as in portent, also often used as a synonym for omen. I also prefer my omens to be ominous – a word I understand to be derived from omen, and to convey foreboding.

In other words, I prefer my omens to be big and bad – and ideally weird. Comets and eclipses. Animals born with two heads or no eyes. Spontaneous animal or human combustion. Raving and gibbering hooded figures. And so on.

So as a method of divination, it’s not distinct from any other method of divination, except to the extent its omens might be bigger, badder or weirder.

It doesn’t exactly leap out as a school of magic either, but perhaps with a little imagination might be adapted to a school of magic powered by charms, curses, and hexes. I can imagine a luck-fuelled school of magic in urban fantasy, perhaps styled as tychomancy, based on superstitions, lucky symbols or signs of bad luck – perhaps even powered by channelling signs of bad luck (broken mirrors and so on) into good magic, like some sort of mojo judo.

RATING: 4 STARS****
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