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Divination:

Martial Activities

A brief look at divination techniques in martial activities throughout history.

Phelippe le Vigneron

Thank you so much… I’m excited to share some research that I have been working on..

Our prompt, explore a marital technique. As I began to explore research options. I was curious if there might be overlap between the martial community and another interest of mine as a member of the member of the East Kingdom Soothsayer’s guild.

In looking at any persona, it was important to make decisions that fulfilled the will of the gods. How do we know? WHen to plant our crops, who will be selected for a particular position...we need a way to communicate with a higher authority.

We often think of scrying into mirrors, casting dice, or looking at runes. But they often used everyday items. Including their martial items. TOday, I want to explore how these two seemingly disparate worlds overlap. Today is just a brief examination, but there is plenty of additional research to be discussed and to be discovered.

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Martial divination techniques

Many divination techniques involving martial weapons:

Macharomancy - swords or daggers
Belomancy - arrows
Axinomancy - axes, hatchets, saws
Rhabdomancy - rod, wand, staff, or stick (most often associated with dousing rods)

The Mag-astro-mancer. John Gaule, 1652

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Many resources have documented the use of martial weaponry as divinatory tools in both fiction and non-fiction sources. Here are a few samples:

Cicero - In Ancient Rome, Cicero documents using the electrical flashes from the points of spears, swords, and javelins as divinatory means before battles.�From De Divinatione, 36�Macharomancy
Chacuer - The character of the Parson warns us of “...horrible swearing of adjuration and conjuration as done by these false enchanters or necromancers in basins full of water, or in a bright sword…”�Canterbury Tales, Geoffrey Chaucer, ed. John Urban Nicolson, pg. 504; Macharomancy (scrying)
Book of Ezekiel - …”He will cast lots with arrows, he will consult his idols, he will examine the liver.”�Ezekiel 21;19-23, NIV �Belomancy

Various forms of martial divination

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Celts

“The Romans put a stop to the customs connected with the sacrifice and divination as they were in conflict with our own ways. For example, they would strike a man who had been consecrated for sacrifice in the back with a sword and make prophecies based on his death spasms... Such horrifying reports were used by the Romans to justify the conquest of Celtic peoples in order to civilize them.”

The Earth and Its Peoples: A Global History

By Richard Bulliet, Pamela Crossley, Daniel Headrick, Steven Hirsch, Lyman Johnson pg. 87

Cultural Insights

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Ifa of the Yoruba People

Ifa, a religion and divinatory practice, is filled with martial imagery throughout it’s literary canon, Odu Ifa. One of the practices mentioned involve casting divinatory objects, a process known as da[i]fa or, quite literally, “throw down Ifa.” The allusion is to both casting stones and to wrestling as seen in the following:

In his incarnate form, Orunmila (another name for Ifa) was a wrestling champion who conspired with Eshu (the trickster) to allow himself to lose wrestling matches by being thrown in return for payments from challengers. This process of divination is a way to arrange future outcomes.

For the Yoruba, the word used for their divinatory process of casting stones is intrinsically linked to the concept of wrestling - “to throw down.”

Martial Arts of the World: An Encyclopedia of History and Innovation 2nd Edition, edited by Thomas A. Green, Joseph R. Svinth, pg. 333

Cultural Insights

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Connections to our Persona

Today we are expanding our knowledge in so many ways regarding martial techniques. In taking a cue from the Yoruba, we are all working to learn how to better “Throw Down.” Thank you for allowing me a few moments to come at this from a slightly different angle.

So much of our game is about living history - to try and learn to think like our persona would have. Using our weapons, using martial items, as a way to determine the will of God(s) is a perfectly period practice we can incorporate into our own persona development.