Free ‘divine gallery’ sample art from OldWorldGods
It’s my top 10 mancy list. I’m talking the suffix -mancy, ultimately originating from the Greek manteia (of itself or through the Latin mantia), for divination.
I could have called it top ten methods of divination, but where’s the fun in that? A top ten mancy list is just more fun and I do indeed have my criteria that each entry must have the suffix. Also, while the suffix -mancy technically only connotes divination, it has been used more widely for systems or types of magic in general.
This conflation of the suffix -mancy to connote both divination in particular and magic in general is not entirely misplaced. After all, divination tends to operate by or be a type of magic.
Indeed, it is arguably the primary purpose for which people have sought to use magic, rivalled only by protective magic – apotropaic magic as it is more technically known, or abjuration as it is called as a “school” of magic in Dungeons and Dragons.
It is also not a stretch to regard all magic as ultimately originating in divination, divining the secret knowledge and cosmic power underlying magic itself. So much so in editions of Dungeons and Dragons, while one could pick and choose between schools of magic, the one compulsory school was divination.
But I digress – for the purposes of my top ten mancy list, I look at each -mancy in terms of ranking it both as a method of divination in particular and as a ‘school’ of magic in general.
And now to the suffix itself, 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 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. I have preferred broader brush strokes for my top ten or special mention, although entries might include more specialized methods of divination within their general theme.
Finally, it goes without saying that the top ten or special mentions does not reflect any personal beliefs in methods of divination or forms of magic, just my interest in them. It’s one of my dreams to walk in on an appointment with a psychic, smack them in the head, and exclaim “didn’t see that one coming?” – or just for all purported psychics to be prosecuted for fraud.
I also can’t resist the title of Top 10 Mancy list as there’s a whole gag in an episode of Archer where the titular protagonist is calling for help defusing a bomb and confuses everyone by using ‘mancy’ for m (in the serial number) where they naturally think he’s saying ‘nancy’ for n. I know it’s a long segue but it’s lodged in my psyche ever since whenever I think of mancy.