But wait – there’s more mancy!

Of course, you knew that already.

There is a plethora of methods of divination (or types of magic) connoted by the suffix -mancy, indeed so many that I could have done my usual twenty special mentions several times over. Just look at the Wikipedia entry for methods of divination – or the TV Tropes entry for whatevermancy.

As I said in my introduction to the top ten, there is an almost overwhelming number of variants of divination (or magic) with that suffix -mancy, and their sheer abundance has always fascinated me. In part that reflects the ease by which one can coin such a word, usually by combining a Latin or Greek root word with -mancy. However, it predominantly reflects connoting forms of divination actually used by people as observed or recorded in history or anthropology – as people have used almost anything and everything as the magical means of divination.

Of course, some or even many are incredibly particular, esoteric or obscure as a result – to use just one example to illustrate, belomancy (or bolomancy) is the art of divination by use of arrows.

Accordingly, I have continued to prefer the broader brush strokes I used in my top ten for the special mentions as well, although as usual I splash out with some wilder entries in my special mentions.

And once again, it goes without saying that the top ten or special mentions does or do not reflect any personal beliefs in methods of divination or forms of magic, just my interest in them.

 

 

(1) GYNOMANCY

 

“Frenzied women from whose lips the god speaks”

Yes – there is no entry for gynomancy in the Wikipedia list of methods of divination and I made it up for special mention from the suffix gyno-, but it does have some basis in history or mythology and even more potential in fantasy, both enough for goddess-tier ranking.

But first, gynomancy might be defined in one of two ways – divination of women, or divination by women.

The first is essentially divination by observations of women or a woman – for example, perhaps along the lines of somatomancy or divination by the female body or its feminine aspects, which would make for a novel twist on those FBI female body inspector shirts. “Please undress – trust me, I’m a gynomancer!”

The second is of course divination or magic by women – one of few areas extending back in history and mythology prior to the modern period where women match or even exceed men in otherwise patriarchal societies.

Sure, the Bible is mostly a patriarchal prophet boys’ club, with prophets such as Jeremiah famously ranting about Israel as an unfaithful wife (and sleeping around with other gods), but even it does have female prophets, albeit usually without books to their name (with arguable exceptions such as Esther).

Elsewhere, however, divination had more equal opportunities. Walter Burkert observed that the “frenzied women from whose lips the god speaks” were recorded as far back as the Near East in the second millennium BC or Assyria in the first millennium BC, and there were similar female figures (heh) in Egypt. Often these female figures were associated with snakes, which puts a different spin on Eve and the Serpent in Genesis.

However, the most famous female figures of divination were from classical history. Foremost among them was the Pythoness or Pythia of the Delphic Oracle (there’s that snake association again), albeit as the mouthpiece of Apollo as god of prophecy. For Rome, there was the Sibyl and her Sibylline Books.

Yet female divination or gynomancy goes even further than this with the female figures that recur throughout European mythology and folklore as forces of fate or fortune, typically as a trinity, from the Fates of classical mythology to the weird sisters of Macbeth – at least speaking to human fate or fortune, if not actively making or shaping it, and enduring even as witches or fairies (or fairy godmothers) in fairy tales.

This female trinity varies, but one of the most popular conceptions of it is as the trinity of Maiden, Mother and Crone, occasionally styled as the phases of the moon (waxing, full and waning) or the trope of the Hecate Sisters – and there’s an argument for each of the trinity as definitively embodying the female aspect for divination or magic.

Perhaps the obvious female aspect is female sexuality, typically represented by the Maiden – although perhaps with characteristic irony (or duality), divination or magic may be associated with virginity, with one theme being the loss of such powers with the loss of virginity. Think Vestal Virgins but with divination or magic to go along with their sacred position – or Solitaire in the James Bond film Live and Let Die.

Of course, divination or magic may also be associated with active female sexuality (which raises a number of interesting possibilities for gynomancy in fantasy) – which may also take us from the Maiden to that figure with the most powerful ultimate expression of female sexuality, the Mother (which again raises a number of interesting possibilities for gynomancy in fantasy being based on pregnancy, or giving birth, or nursing, and so on). And of course mothers are generally known for prophetic pronouncements, particularly to their children.

“Two things, my lord, must thee know of the wise woman. First, she is…a woman. And second, she is…”
“Wise?”
“You do know her, then?”
“No, just a wild stab in the dark, which is, incidentally, what you’ll be getting if you don’t start being more helpful”

The Crone tends to involve female aspects other than active sexuality – but there’s a long history of weird sisters, wise women and witches that speak for her as a figure of divination and magic.

Speaking of the Hecate Sisters, there is Hecate herself as the literal goddess of magic in classical mythology, reflecting the recurring role of divine female figures for magic in mythology – Isis and Freya come to mind – although in fairness divine magic is distributed among both gods and goddesses as part of their nature. Odysseus is particularly reliant on the kindness of divine female strangers and their magic in the Odyssey, prompting speculation of female authorship for that epic.

Anyway, gynomancy has a lot of potential, particularly in fantasy, as either or both of a method of divination or school of magic. Bonus points if divination or magic is exclusively gynomancy – that is, only women can use divination or magic (or some similar variation, such as they are more attuned to or powerful in its use), which opens up considerable potential for equalizing sexes or powerful female characters in fantasy. Indeed, there’s a whole trope for it – Magic is Feminine.

 

RATING: 5 STARS*****
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(2) CHARTOMANCY – CARTOMANCY (TAROMANCY)

 

“I stayed up late playing poker with Tarot cards. I got a full house and four people died” – Steve Wright

Special mention to the first of what I call my casino trinity of mancy – cartomancy or divination by cards, with the foremost of those being divination by Tarot cards, occasionally styled as taromancy.

That casino quip is not casual – I suspect there is a substantial overlap between methods of divination and gambling in games of chance or fortune, evolving to or from the other. However, it is not an area in which I have read (if such references exist), although Encyclopedia Britannica at least seems to endorse that gambling evolved from divination.

I have read that something of the reverse happened with Tarot cards. Tarot cards appear to have originated as the very subject of Wright’s joke – a more mundane medium for playing card games – but subsequently acquired their mystique as a means for divination, often in popular culture with dire portents Wright played on for his joke.

Less dramatically, cartomancy tends to use standard playing cards, which were introduced into Europe (from foreign origins, apparently ultimately from China) at about the same time as Tarot, albeit not necessarily in their contemporary form. I understand that the history (and historical forms) of playing cards is less than clear, as is the Tarot and any relationship between them – contrary to my former beliefs (from superficial reading) that playing cards evolved from the Tarot.

Cartomancy is itself a form of chartomancy, which is divination by…paper?! Well, not just any paper, but paper with things on it – which could potentially be as simple as paper with different colors on it (for example, drawn randomly by a querent) but more usually paper with words or visual symbols written or printed on it, hence cartomancy.

I suspect chartomancy is more a label of convenience for similar methods of divination using written or printed words or symbols on paper rather than a meaningful denomination for divination from paper of itself. Although apparently there was papyromancy for divination by folding paper – reading the creases from crumpled paper not unlike the lines in a hand in palmistry.

Writing (including writing visual symbols) probably did have an appearance of magic or at least some mystique to it with the advent of literacy which was passed on to its mediums including paper – arguably reflected in the enduring image of magic in books or scrolls.

Another example of chartomancy would be fortune cookies – used more now for casual entertainment, but apparently (or at least arguably) with a serious historical pedigree dating back to Mesopotamia and Greece, occasionally termed as aleuromancy or divination by the use of flour.

Yet another example would be stichomancy (occasionally styled as rhapsodomancy), divination by lines of verse (or poetry), or what I might call small-b bibliomancy, literally divination by books – of which the most famous is big-b Bibliomancy, or divination by the Bible, typically by lines or passages “taken at hazard” or at random.

Obviously other books can and have been used, although usually of equal significance – Homer’s Iliad and Oydssey (sometimes styled as stoichomancy or stoicheomancy), the works of Virgil and the mysterious Sybilline Books in Rome, the Koran (or Quran) and so on. I’d like to see dictiomancy – divination by words at random from the dictionary.

As a method of divination, the various forms of chartomancy have a power corresponding to what is used – standard playing cards might seem mundane but Tarot cards have the emotional resonance of their vivid, and violent, visual imagery.

And as a type of magic, there’s that enduring image of books and scrolls as the means for magic, including in Dungeons and Dragons. It would be intriguing to extend that to cards, perhaps adapted in different styles or schools of magic from card games such as poker or blackjack. Or perhaps conjuration using Tarot cards – although Dungeons and Dragons has done something of the sort with its Deck of Many Things.

Although knowing my luck, I’d mostly draw Swords, perhaps echoing Indiana Jones and snakes. “Swords – why did it have to be Swords?”.

 

RATING: 4 STARS****
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(3) CLEROMANCY – ASTRAGALOMANCY

 

God does play dice with the universe!

Or in other words a crapshoot…

The second of my casino trinity of mancy for special mention

Strictly speaking, cleromancy is divination by casting lots, as the prefix clero- derives from the Greek root for lot – a method of divination or random selection used frequently in ancient history, not least in the Bible where it even appears to be positively endorsed as a means to divine God’s will.

However, it is used more generally as a label of convenience for divination by other means of random selection – interestingly, for which casting also tends to be used as a verb, most definitively casting a die or dice, often styled as astragalomancy (for “dice” from bones).

It can extend to similar things such as the I Ching in China. One might also extend it to numismatomancy or divination by coins, although typically one flips or tosses a coin rather than casting it in modern parlance.

As a means of divination, it has the powerful simplicity of its random mechanic, arguably the most random of any method of divination, although it still boils down to how the diviner assigns the possible outcomes.

And as a school of magic – well, perhaps it’s not so random that the other thing for which the word cast or casting is frequently used is magic, as in casting a spell or spellcasting. Or that dice are famously used as the mechanics of gameplay for magic in games such as Dungeons and Dragons.

I also like the idea of magic as inherently random in nature – what I’d like to style as entropomancy, or the archetypal tropes of chaos magic or wild magic. Powerful perhaps but potentially dangerous or tricky, prone to turning in the hand, or wand as it were – with a will of its own that is more coaxed than controlled, and with unintended consequences even at the best of times when you can shape it to your purpose.

I mean – that’s kind of the point of magic, to indeed play dice outside or with the usual rules of the universe, albeit ideally to load those same dice in your favor. Funnily enough, it seems to me that human life (and biological life in general) is the reverse – brief moments snatched from the basic entropy of the universe.

 

RATING: 4 STARS****
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(4) CYCLOMANCY (GYROMANCY)

 

Wheel of Fortune!

No, seriously – as illustrated by the medieval concept of fate or fortune subsequently used in Tarot cards, although perhaps better known for the modern game show concept

Cyclomancy – or divination by wheels – is the third of my casino trinity of mancy for special mention, obviously invoking roulette.

Of course, it didn’t so much involve the wheel itself, but things inscribed on the wheel, and spinning the wheel as a means of randomizing selection of outcome – not unlike the game show concept.

“Bust a deal, face the wheel” – Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome might be my least favorite of the franchise but it did have some interesting (and memorable) concepts, one of which was its cyclomantic system of justice or law enforcement. Yet again, however, it illustrates that such things usually boil down to how the diviner assigns the possible outcomes – with Aunty Entity stacking the wheel heavily in her favor with a large part of it designated as Aunty’s Choice.

I don’t know how prevalent cyclomancy was as a means of divination in classical Greece – I suspect not very as against more dramatic or emotive methods of divination – but I’d like to imagine the Delphic Oracle as a game-show style of Wheel of Fortune, spun by a delectable Pythoness. Although probably the better game show model would be something like Family Feud, down to the actual feuding families – “we surveyed a hundred divine beings and if your answer is not up on the board…”

Cyclomancy is part of that stereotypical childhood or adolescent game of spin the bottle – as for that matter is gyromancy or divination by dizziness, except for games where you’re the thing being spun. Sometimes you spin the bottle and sometimes the bottle spins you.

As a method of divination, it shares the powerful simplicity of its random mechanic with cleromancy, albeit one readily cheated by not only stacking the wheel in your favor, but also with various carnival means of interfering with the spinning of it.

As a school of magic, it does not seem so readily applicable – although I like the image of wizards using spell wheels in the manner of prayer wheels or similar objects (or, for the Dungeons and Dragons class of cleric, using prayer wheels).

However, it has a thematic applicability similar to the random nature (or entropomancy) of cleromancy, except also the reverse – in that it is not so much random but cyclical, ultimately moved by a larger pattern or even cosmic balance. What goes up must come down – and part of the art of cyclomancy is riding the wave of the cycle in your favor.

Cyclomancy can even overlap with sacrificial hieromancy – in that you can spin the wheel of fortune in your favor but you have to pay a price, at least when the wheel spins back, or perhaps even to take a spin in the first place.

 

RATING: 4 STARS****
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(5) NOMANCY / ONOMANCY

 

“The name is the thing, and the true name is the true thing.”

Yes – we’re talking the divination or magic of names. Although typically it involves not just any names, particularly the names we so casually toss about for ourselves in our daily lives, but true names or names of power, even if they have to be discovered through nomancy or onomancy itself, sometimes to those who have forgotten or don’t know their own true name or nature.

“A person’s true name might be self-determined, or bestowed on them by someone else — possibly in a religious or magical ritual, or it could be stolen, or given away”. It also tends to be something a person or being jealously guards or keeps secret – although that often applies to names in general, as with Odysseus with his name to Polyphemus.

A true name perfectly describes something’s essential nature – one might well say its soul or spirit – and knowing a true name gives one power over the owner of the name.

It is a concept with a long pedigree in mythology and folklore which I suspect originates in prehistory with human language itself and our ability to vocalise or for verbal thought, which often seem magical of themselves.

Some of the most striking illustrations of it are in the Bible, particularly in the creation myths of Genesis – from God essentially naming or speaking creation into existence to Adam naming the animals. True names might be said to reflect the divine language of heaven or the primal language of creation.

Interestingly, that goes for the name of God as well and there’s a whole running theme in or from the Bible about the power of God’s true name or names – from the Tetragrammaton (or four letters YHWH representing God) to the multiple or secret names of God giving power over creation, hence the various taboos revolving around the name (or names) of God (including one of the Ten Commandments).

I would argue that it also underlies the concept of Plato’s Forms – indeed, it might be argued that one’s true name essentially corresponds to one’s Form. It also perhaps underlies magic words or incantations in general.

There is even a myth, whether it has any historical truth or otherwise, that the city of Rome had a true name, safeguarded and kept secret lest her enemies learn of it to curse her or gain power over her.

All that is very well but it doesn’t seem to make for much by way of a method of divination – except of course to divine a true name as part of magic. Well, perhaps for things like those childhood or adolescent games in which one “calculates” the compatibility of a crush or love interest, although they tend to involve alphanumeric keys based on letters.

As a system or school of magic, it comes close even to oneiromancy as arguably the original source of all divination, as well as magic and religion in general – the ability to shape reality to our conceptual and verbal thought, perhaps even to define things into existence.

Not coincidentally, it is a concept that often underlies or is at least invoked by game mechanics for magic in Dungeons and Dragons – although not as a core mechanic given its potential power. Hence the class of truenamer, which on paper was a decent concept, but its actual mechanics in game play were so bad that it was widely acknowledged to be so hopelessly broken as the worst class of the game.

 

RATING: 4 STARS****
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(6) ARITHMANCY

 

Lucky numbers and sacred geometry!

Also Pythagoras – whom I used to think of as a grounded philosopher and mathematician from his theorem at school, because schools don’t teach how much of a mystical kook he was as well. Mind you, the same goes for Greek philosophers in general, as E.R. Dodds propounded in The Greeks and the Irrational.

And yes – apparently numerology was known as arithmancy prior to the 20th century, and frankly still should be rather than coopting a name more appropriate to a science to itself, similarly to astrology. Also – numeromancy was sitting right there!

In fairness, similarly to astrology contributing to astronomy, numerology may have contributed to science, albeit more numerology in the broader sense of numeric patterns – as per British mathematician I. J. Good, “there have been a few examples of numerology that have led to theories that transformed society…It would be fair enough to say that numerology was the origin of the theories of electromagnetism, quantum mechanics, gravitation….”

Arithmancy or divinatory numerology essentially involves “a belief in an occult, divine or mystical relationship between a number and one or more coinciding events” – or that certain numbers have certain mystical or symbolic properties. Or in short – lucky (and unlucky) numbers. The same concept can also be applied to the mathematical properties of geometry – hence sacred geometry.

As for the numbers themselves, they may come from some process of random selection (not unlike modern lotteries) or from assigning numeric values to other things, such as an alphanumeric system for letters in words or names (overlapping with my previous special mention for nomancy or onomancy).

That last is also known as gematria, a practice dating back to ancient history and (in)famously appearing in the Bible as 666 or the Number of the Beast in the Book of Apocalypse – or as I like to quip, that sixy beast – for which the scholarly consensus is that it is an alphanumeric key to the Roman Emperor Nero. (It’s a little more messy than that – I understand it wasn’t the actual Nero, but some sort of projected supercharged revenant Nero back from the dead, and could also be rendered alternatively as 616, as it was in some versions).

The strength of arithmancy or numerology as both method of divination and school of magic lies in the elegance and explanatory power of mathematics to explain the fundamental properties of our reality – something which is ever more so in modern science, where whole swathes of reality only seem explicable entirely as increasingly arcane mathematical formulae.

To the point that our physical reality often seems a coalescence or crystallization of mathematics or numbers – it is not so much that everything has a true name but a true number.

I can’t resist closing with two of my favorite incarnations of arithmancy in science fiction.

The first is the basic arithmantic principles underlying the Laundry series by Charles Stross – where the magic is essentially arithmancy or mathematics (and where the growing computing power of humanity and its machines will reach a threshold drawing the attention of hostile Lovecraftian entities).

The second is my favorite version of arithmancy in a charming (and characteristically horny) short story by Fritz Leiber – in which the number seven assumes a sexy female personification. Hot damn – that would have made maths classes more interesting at school!

 

RATING: 4 STARS****
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(7) BOTANOMANCY

 

“The force that through the green fuse drives the flower”

Sadly, botanomancy or divination by plants seems to get short shrift compared to theriomancy or divination by animals, even though both probably originate in prehistory – with prehistoric humans depending as much on observations of plant life as they did animal life.

Even the term botanomancy itself is read more narrowly, at least in the Wikipedia entry for it, as divination by burning particular plants (similarly to burning laurel wreaths or daphomancy), but this seems more in the nature of pyromancy.

There are also references to anthomancy or divination by flowers (as well as phyllorhodomancy or divination by rose petals), dendromancy or divination by trees, and phyllomancy or divination by leaves (as well as sycomacy or divination by fig leaves).

However, none of these references elaborate anything by way of divinatory practice in history, although the specificity of some of those references – rose petals or fig leaves – suggest some specific practice. One can imagine divination by scattering rose petals in much the same way as dirt in geomancy and it would make for a more romantic date, if nothing else.

At very least, there’s that romantic divinatory game of plucking petals from a flower – s/he loves me, s/he loves me not…

One can also imagine divination by spots in leaves or fruit and so on, or perhaps patterns of where they fall. There’s also that Celtic tree alphabet (or ogham), which was the weird focus in Robert Graves’ The White Goddess – although it’s hard to tell with that book – in a manner suggestive of divination or magic. In fairness, the Wikipedia reference to dendromancy does note particular trees – “especially oaks, yews, or mistletoe” – and druids seemed to go nuts for that last one.

Ironically, the (vaguely) botanomantic reference which is elaborated in most detail is tasseomancy or divination by patterns in tea leaves or coffee grounds – which however is both a relatively recent method of divination and also more akin to hydromancy by brewing.

As a method of divination, botanomancy just seems a little low tier in comparison even only to theriomancy – perhaps plant life operates on too long (or slow) a time scale for practical divination, or perhaps we just have more of an emotional attachment to animals. Unless you’re communing with the Green in the style of Swamp Thing or Poison Ivy.

As a school of magic, however, I rank it as top tier – again essentially combining the Dungeons and Dragons classes of wizard and druid. It’s arguably up there with the elemental schools of magic – indeed the Chinese had five classical elements, one of which was wood. That’s especially so if you can control or grow plants, again in the style of Swamp Thing or Poison Ivy.

Alternatively, with a little fantasy or imagination it’s up there with theriomancy, but as a literal way of plant powers – with one of many applications replicating the effects of plant-based toxins or drugs.

 

RATING: 4 STARS****
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(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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(9) CLEDONOMANCY (CLAMANCY & CHRESMOMANCY)

 

Serendipity and synchronicity.

Or crowd-sourcing your divination.

Cledonomancy is divination by chance events or overheard words, using the prefix cledon- from the Greek root for rumor.

“A kind of divination based on chance events or encounters, such as words occasionally uttered…rumor, a report, omen, fame, name.”

In some ways cledonomancy seems the inverse of cryptomancy or divination by omens, at least omens as big, bad or weird events. Instead cledonomancy involves mundane events of chance significance or synchronicity.

Apparently one example of cledonomancy was for the querent to whisper a question into the god’s ear at a shrine (presumably of a statue or something similar) and then listen for the god’s answer among chance words of pedestrians outside the shrine.

This is also styled as clamancy, divination by random shouts or cries heard in crowds, at night or so on – although I also have a soft spot for chresmomancy or divination by the ravings of lunatics, or its contemporary equivalent of Twitter.

As a method of divination, it has a certain appeal and force to it – serendipity in common parlance or what Jung styled as synchronicity. It also seems immensely practical – easy to do at home (especially through ‘surfing’ radio, television, or internet), at work, or generally out and about.

As a school of magic, it would seem to be in the same territory of entropomancy, chaos magic, or wild magic as cleromancy.

 

RATING: 4 STARS****
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(10) XENOMANCY

 

“A prophet is never accepted in his home town”

The divination and magic of strangers, stranger kings, stranger things…and aliens?

Unlike gynomancy, Wikipedia’s list of methods of divination includes xenomancy or divination by strangers, but there is nothing beyond its mere inclusion in the list.

Similarly to gynomancy, however, it might be defined in one of two ways – as divination of strangers, or as divination by strangers. In other words, the stranger as omen or oracle, portent or prophet – the stranger as divinatory object or the stranger as divinatory (or magic) figure.

In the first, the querent divines their answer from the appearance or characteristics of strangers. And to be honest, it doesn’t seem to offer much as a method of divination, much less a school of magic, except as something akin to that game of anticipating the color of the next car one sees driving past.

Of course, strangers arriving at one’s home have more of an import, but it would probably be a safe bet for a diviner to foresee trouble, particularly if the strangers are armed.

The latter – where the stranger is the diviner or magical figure – has far more potential. The wandering stranger was basically Odin’s schtick – and he was hardly alone among gods, angels or kings in that. Even Jesus pulled this trick, accompanying two of his followers unrecognized after his resurrection, only to vanish when they recognised him.

My featured quote was also by Jesus, who turned out to be the biggest stranger prophet of all for the Roman Empire, among various cults of mysterious strangers from the east, and of course beyond that to the world.

In the Bible, Jonah played a similar role on a smaller scale as stranger prophet to the Assyrian Empire – everyone remembers him being swallowed by a “fish” but forgets why he was swallowed in the first place, because he was trying to shirk his role as a stranger prophet.

And then there’s the theory of stranger kings, a theory developed by anthropologist Marshall Sahlins, essentially as to ‘native’ peoples accepting foreign rulers (particularly in the context of European colonialism) – a theory which may well overlap with stranger prophets or strangers as magical figures.

Xenomancy has intriguing fantasy narrative potential as underlying either divination or magic – that people can practice divination or use magic but only as strangers away from their homeland, but the most common trope involves them being in another world altogether, from portal fantasy in literature to isekai in Japanese manga or anime. Two examples spring readily to mind – Narnia (although there they are more stranger kings or heroes) and the Thomas Covenant Chronicles.

It even has intriguing SF narrative potential, particularly when one uses xeno- for its most common contemporary application to aliens – aliens as divinatory or magic figures to humans (or perhaps vice versa). One could even conjure up a contemporary form of xenomancy of divination (or magic) using alien or UFO sightings or lore.

Of course, fantasy often does much the same, but for particular fantasy races with respect to humans – elves effectively being a magical or semi-divine race to the more mundane humans or hobbits in The Lord of the Rings. For that matter, divinatory or magical aliens in SF often tend to be effectively space elves.

 

RATING: 4 STARS****
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(11) ABACOMANCY

 

“I will show you fear in a handful of dust”

“Ah what a dusty answer gets the soul
When hot for certainties in this our life”

I could do these dusty quotes all day, although apparently dusty answer has become a term used for unsatisfactory reply, which does not bode well for abacomancy or divination by dust. However, I just couldn’t resist special mention for it and not just because it was literally the first entry in alphabetical order in Wikipedia’s list of methods of divination.

Disappointingly, it didn’t involve oracles in temples full of dust and cobwebs, but apparently something akin to geomancy – divining patterns in dust, dirt, sand, silt or ashes after being thrown or dropped on a flat surface. Also, Jackson Pollack was into it, doing a series of paintings for it.

Of course, I prefer to cite abacomancy as my go-to excuse for not cleaning my home.

As a method of divination or school of magic, abacomancy seems a little, well, dusty. Although I’d like to imagine abacomancy as a school of magic in a post-apocalyptic fantasy setting – magic powered by dust and detritus, flotsam and jetsam, rust and ruins. Essentially, necromancy but for objects instead of living things (although the two could overlap), a Magic of Broken Things along the lines of the God of the Lost in Stephen King’s The Girl of Who Loved Tom Gordon (although again those could overlap).

Come to think of it, a Magic of the Wasteland – both in terms of the form and style of T.S. Eliot’s poem of that name, the source of my handful of dust quote.

 

RATING: 4 STARS****
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(12) SCIOMANCY

 

“And I will show you something different from either
Your shadow at morning striding behind you
Or your shadow at evening rising to meet you”

Literally a divination from or of shadows, although Wikipedia’s list of methods of divination also includes it as divination by spirits, presumably along the lines of the usage of shades for spirits or ghosts in the underworld, a meaning in use even today although it originates from usage in classical Greece and Rome.

Unfortunately, Wikipedia doesn’t elaborate on either in terms of method of divination, linking sciomancy to an article on theurgy. I’d like to imagine it involving oracles as some form of literal shadow play or shadows cast on a wall, perhaps even originating from the shadows cast from the flickering fires of prehistory.

One might even argue that Plato saw all but philosophers like himself as metaphorical sciomancers, as the reality of our perception effectively consists of shadows cast from the true metaphysical reality of ideal Forms.

Or in other words, the world of our perception is smoke and mirrors – although that seems an awesome combination with sciomancy as a method of divination or school of magic of shadows, smoke and mirrors, which would obviously lean heavily into illusion and perception. Throw in echoes as well and now we’re cooking.

Or for that matter combining sciomancy with the abacomancy of the previous entry – or with the necromancy of the more metaphorical use of shades or shadows. Or of darkness in general. Or all of the above.

Interestingly, Dungeons and Dragons has effectively featured sciomancy as part of its prestige or specialist classes of character, albeit typically as an arcane or magic enhancement of its rogue class.

 

RATING: 4 STARS****
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(13) NARCOMANCY

 

“And all should cry, Beware! Beware!
His flashing eyes, his floating hair!
Weave a circle round him thrice,
And close your eyes with holy dread
For he on honey-dew hath fed,
And drunk the milk of Paradise”

And now we come to my wild-tier, more playful entries I (mostly) made up for special mention. And yes – that opening quote is from Kubla Khan, or Samuel Taylor Coleridge playing poetic narcomancer on opium.

Narcomancy is what I’ve coined for divination by drugs or more precisely divination by intoxication or the effect of drugs. I’m joking and serious – the serious part being is that this is how I tend to believe historical divination actually worked, because they’d slip in some drugs somewhere for visions or apparently profound insights.

While narcomancy would effectively work as a sort of drugged oneiromancy for divination, it would only be a mechanic for a school of magic, with the effective source of magic as another -mancy, but you can only tap into it while adversely affected, with fun fantasy potential for different drugs accessing different sources or types of magic.

 

RATING: 4 STARS****
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(14) DIPSOMANCY (MARGARITOMANCY)

 

Sometimes you drink the bottle and sometimes the bottle drinks you.

Essentially a narrower subset of narcomancy, dipsomancy is what I’ve coined for divination by alcohol or drunkeness – from the same Greek root (dipso- for thirst) that gives us dipsomania, a fancy word for alcoholism.

Again there’s some fun fantasy potential for dipsomancy as a magical way of the Drunken Master, in the style of the Jackie Chan film featuring a drunken martial arts style, but for divination or magic.

Bonus points for margaritomancy – finally a method of divination or school of magic for which I’ve spent my whole drinking life in training! Sadly, the actual definition of margaritomancy does not, in fact, involve the cocktail of my signature drink, but pearls – from the Greek root word for pearl. That won’t stop me continue to train as a cocktail margaritomancer

 

 

RATING: 4 STARS****
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(15) DISCOMANCY

 

Yes, I made this one up, for latter day dervishes as it were, prompted by my other invention dipsomancy – with which one suspects discomancy would commonly overlap.

Yes, it’s a playful reference to the visual or sensory ambience of participants in contemporary dance music having something of the same dramatic or ritual resonance of divination or magic.

Also shufflemancy – a contemporary neologism actually used by some people today essentially as a type of cledonomancy (or clamancy) from the random selection of music playlists.

But as usual with these playful entries, I’m joking and I’m serious – the serious part being the long history of ecstatic dance or music in magic or religion, probably going back into prehistory and often to the point of metaphysical significance of cosmos or life itself as a dance. After all, are we not all dancers to the beat of our own hearts?

Famously, there’s the depiction of Shiva as Nataraja or Lord of the Dance – and manic dancing was also the ecstatic schtick of Dionysus and the Maenads.

It’s even in the Bible – perhaps most famously with Salome and her Dance of the Seven Veils, albeit not so much in the text itself (which omits even her name), and which may or may not have its origin in myths of the goddess Ishtar.

There’s also King David dancing “before the Lord with all his might”, much to the disapproval of his wife as his dancing left little to the imagination of female viewers. That’s right – it’s the Old Testament meets Magic Mike.

In some ways, it would be a type of somatomancy, using the (dancing) human body and its movements as a source of divination or magic (by either participants or spectators). It could potentially be even a type of theriomancy, particularly for ‘dances’ that imitated or invoked animal movements, or one of the elemental forms of divination or magic for dance imitating the movements of air, fire or water. It’s not much of a conceptual leap from the martial arts style of movements for the bending in Avatar to dance.

In a nutshell, similarly to other entries, it would seem more a mechanism for invoking divination or magic from other sources – again with fun fantasy potential for different dances or dance styles accessing different sources or types of magic.

After all, there’s the whole Dungeons and Dragons class of bard for evoking magic (and other things) using music, which is pretty silly when you think about it. As Elan the bard said of his class in the webcomic The Order of the Stick – “You walk into dungeons and SING at people. Who could take that seriously?”

And I for one am all here for taking to that to the next level with dungeon dance-offs. (Although I’m pretty sure there’s prestige classes or rules for adapting bards to dance as it is in the game – even memes of orc bard dancers).

 

RATING: 4 STARS****
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(16) MEGAPOLISOMANCY

 

Are you a lucky little lady in the city of light?

I didn’t make this one up – fantasy and SF writer Fritz Leiber did, the plot concept behind his literal urban fantasy novel Our Lady of Darkness.

Essentially it’s a type of divination or magic formed from large cities (Leiber’s city of residence San Francisco), that essentially coalesced from the psychic energy (in the Jungian sense) of masses of people.

It’s proved a particularly resonant concept, both for me personally and for the fantasy genre since. Neil Gaiman did something of a spin on it with his magical underground London Below in Neverwhere – I particularly like how each city has its mystical Beast at its heart.

And I understand N.K. Jemisin is doing something similar with human avatars of cities in her Great Cities series.

 

RATING: 4 STARS****
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(17) CHRONOMANCY

 

“Mastery is achieved when telling time becomes telling time what to do”

Funnily enough, Wikipedia does feature chronomancy among its methods of divination in terms similar to geomancy but with respect to time rather than space – the divination of the best or most propitious time to do something, or the determination of lucky and unlucky days.

Although arguably all divination is ultimately a form of chronomancy – in so far as it looks through time to the past or future.

However, the more popular usage of chronomancy is with respect to magic for moving through or manipulating time – potentially the most ridiculously overpowered form of magic if given full force.

And with a little imagination, it can adapt or replicate the usual schools of magic in Dungeons and Dragons in some form or other. Divination is straightforward, but also conjuration of anything from any time, such as dinosaurs.

And so on through time transmutation even to some sort of weird time necromancy with enough imagination or lateral thinking – time ghosts or time zombies, anyone?

 

RATING: 4 STARS****
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(18) TECHNOMANCY

 

“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic”

Technomancy is an odd chimera of a beast, given that technology sort of goes against the whole point of magic – technology is functional magic that actually works.

As such, technomancy tends not to be used as divination but a form of magic or other ability that pops up in certain works of fantasy, usually contemporary or urban fantasy in settings with technology, or occasional SF.

Sometimes it is styled as technopathy (or to a lesser extent machine empathy) – “someone who can control machines and bend them to the user’s will, either through a physical or mental interface link. In some cases, this power also allows them to ‘hear’ what a machine is ‘thinking’ and establish a direct line of communication with the machine”.

It could also be used for magic from technology in SF– where technology is used to replicate magic, occasionally in ways unknown to or forgotten by the people using it – or potentially for where magic is used to power what otherwise appears as technology in certain fantasy settings.

Still, there is fun fantasy potential in combining technology with magic. I’d like to imagine it as a form of magic in a post-apocalyptic fantasy setting using relics from a technological past – or flipping it on its head with an anti-technopath, for someone (or something) that is magically destructive to technology.

 

RATING: 4 STARS****
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(19) NEUROMANCY

 

“What’s your name? Your Turing code. What is it?”
“Neuromancer…Neuro from the nerves, the silver paths. Romancer. Necromancer”.

I didn’t make this one up – the godfather of cyberpunk, William Gibson, did.

Well, technically, he only made up Neuromancer for the title (and titular character) of his landmark 1984 book, but I can’t compile a top ten and special mentions for -mancy without featuring it.

Neuromancer is an AI, in the SF superintelligence sense but neuromancy might well be regarded as the cyberspace hacking that drives the plot and is the forte of the protagonist console cowboy.

Or think the Matrix, since the film franchise borrowed much from Neuromancer, including the term matrix. Of course, it’s not actual magic but technology and skill – in Neuromancer at least, not so sure about the Matrix.

As a method of divination or type of magic, it is essentially cybermancy, which in turn is effectively a subset of technomancy narrowed to computers and computing.

Oh – and Neuromancer wasn’t kidding about the necromancer part, metaphorically at least, since it can create sentient copies or simulations of people’s consciousness in cyberspace, potentially persisting beyond the original.

 

RATING: 4 STARS****
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(20) NYMPHOMANCY

 

Bow Chicka Wow Wow

Yes – I am a nymphomancer. No – I refuse to elaborate. I’ve already said too much.

For mine is the adventurous bed and questing beast, deus sex machina and hieros gamos.

And yes – it is part of my rule in my top tens to throw in a kinky entry amidst my wilder special mentions, usually as my final (twentieth) special mention, at least where the subject matter permits.

Although seriously, there is quite a bit of justification for sex in divination or magic – and even more potential for it in fantasy. I mean, I’m pretty sure I could adapt most of Dungeons and Dragons to nymphomancy.

 

RATING: 4 STARS****
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TOP TENS – MYTHOLOGY:
TOP 10 MANCY
(SPECIAL MENTION)

And here are all twenty special mentions in one list

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(1) GYNOMANCY

“Frenzied women from whose lips the god speaks” – divination or magic of or by women

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My casino trinity of mancy:

(2) CHARTOMANCY – CARTOMANCY (TAROMANCY)

Divination or magic by paper – foremost cartomancy or divination or magic by cards (particularly taromancy – divination or magic by Tarot cards)

(3) CLEROMANCY – ASTRAGALOMANCY

Divination or magic by casting (lots) – foremost astragalomancy or divination or magic by casting dice

(4) CYCLOMANCY (GYROMANCY)

Wheel of Fortune!

Cyclomancy is where you spin the wheel (and gyromancy is where the wheel spins you)

Other top-tier special mention

(5) NOMANCY / ONOMANCY

“The name is the thing and the true name is the true thing” – the divination or magic of (true) names

(6) ARITHMANCY

Lucky numbers and sacred geometry – the divination or magic of numbers

(7) BOTANOMANCY

“The force that through the green fuse drives the flower” – divination or magic by plants

( 8 ) CRYPTOMANCY

Omens and portents

(9) CLEDONOMANCY (CLAMANCY & CHRESMOMANCY)

Serendipity and synchronicity – cledonomancy is divination by chance events or overheard words, foremost clamancy or divination by random shouts or cries heard in crowds (although I also have a soft spot for chresmomancy or divination by the ravings of lunatics, or its contemporary equivalent of X).

(10) XENOMANCY

“A prophet is never accepted in his home town”

The divination and magic of strangers, stranger kings, stranger things…and aliens?

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(11) ABACOMANCY

“I will show you fear in a handful of dust” – divination or magic by dust…or my excuse for not cleaning my home

(12) SCIOMANCY

“And I will show you something different from either
Your shadow at morning striding behind you
Or your shadow at evening rising to meet you”

Literally a divination or magic from or of shadows

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And now we come to my wild-tier, more playful entries I (mostly) made up for special mention

(13) NARCOMANCY

“And all should cry, Beware! Beware!
His flashing eyes, his floating hair!
Weave a circle round him thrice,
And close your eyes with holy dread
For he on honey-dew hath fed,
And drunk the milk of Paradise”

Divination or magic by drugs or more precisely divination by intoxication or the effect of drugs

(14) DIPSOMANCY (MARGARITOMANCY)

Sometimes you drink the bottle and sometimes the bottle drinks you.

Essentially a narrower subset of narcomancy, dipsomancy is what I’ve coined for divination by alcohol or drunkeness

Bonus points for margaritomancy – finally a method of divination or school of magic for which I’ve spent my whole drinking life in training…sadly, the actual definition of margaritomancy does not, in fact, involve the cocktail of my signature drink, but pearls

(15) DISCOMANCY

Yes, I made this one up, for latter day dervishes as it were, prompted by my other invention dipsomancy – with which one suspects discomancy would commonly overlap. Divination or magic by dance

(16) MEGAPOLISOMANCY

Are you a lucky little lady in the city of light?

I didn’t make this one up – fantasy and SF writer Fritz Leiber did, the plot concept behind his literal urban fantasy novel Our Lady of Darkness for divination or magic formed from large cities.

(17) CHRONOMANCY

“Mastery is achieved when telling time becomes telling time what to do”

Divination or magic using time itself

(18) TECHNOMANCY

“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic” – or in this case, divination or magic using technology (or technopathy)

(19) NEUROMANCY (CYBERMANCY)

I didn’t make this one up – the godfather of cyberpunk, William Gibson, did.

(20) NYMPHOMANCY

Bow Chicka Wow Wow

Yes – I am a nymphomancer. No – I refuse to elaborate. I’ve already said too much.