haruspicy
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English
Alternative forms
Etymology
From Latin haruspicium, from haruspex (“diviner of entrails”) + -ium (forming abstract nouns).
Pronunciation
Noun
haruspicy (countable and uncountable, plural haruspicies)
- Divination by use of animal entrails, usually the victims of sacrifice.
- 1807, Charles Buck, A Theological Dictionary, Volume 1, Whitehall, page 238:
- Different kinds of divination, which have passed for sciences, we have had: […] 6. Haruspicy, by inspecting the bowels of animals. […]
- 1825, Horace Smith, Gaieties and Gravities: A Series of Essays, Comic Tales, and Fugitive Vagaries, Volume II, H. Colburn, page 333:
- That our fates should be made dependent upon the stars, planets, and constellations, however preposterous a conceit, at least imparts a dignity to our nature by conjoining earth with Heaven: but that the doom of kings, empires, and individuals, should be regulated by the entrails of victims, as analysed by the butchers of Haruspicy is an evidence of stupid credulity that levels civilised man to the savage
Synonyms
Hyponyms
- hepatomancy, hepatoscopy (haruspicy using livers)
Coordinate terms
- haruspex (a practicer of haruspicy)
Translations
divination by entrails
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