Rare manual of geomancy, with a manuscript on onomantia

[Geomancy]. Curieuse und gantz neue Art zu Punctiren. Aus dem Arabischen ins Deutsche übersetzet von einem Liebhaber dieser Kunst.

€ 1.600,00

Later edition of this oft-reprinted but rare manual of geomancy, a divination system with Arabian origins. The term is derived from the ancient Greek "geômanteía", a translation of the Arabic "'ilm al-raml" - the "science of the sand", or the art of foretelling from dots or lines randomly marked upon the ground or on paper. The method, probably developed in the Near and Middle East, arrived in medieval Europe via North Africa. In the European context it was seen as an ancillary science to astrology and was attributed to Hermes Trismegistus. It was especially Robert Fludd's "Utriusque cosmi maioris scilicet et minoris metaphysica, physica atque technica historia" (1618) that made geomancy popular in the late Renaissance. "Pointing, or geomancy, was among the most popular of the divinatory entertainments of the 17th and 18th century" (cf. Daxelmüller, Zauberpraktiken, p. 200, with fig. 35). Purportedly translated from Arabic, this manual cites Cornelius Agrippa, Henry de Pisis, Trithemius, and Fludd as its authorities.

The manuscript bound at the end of the volume treats of "Onomantia", or the so-called science of divining a person's future from their names - a method explicitly said to work not only with Christian names given at baptism, but also with any name bestowed by a similar process upon a Jew or Muslim.