Prodigy (divination)
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An omen (also called ''portent'') is a
phenomenon A phenomenon ( : phenomena) is an observable event. The term came into its modern philosophical usage through Immanuel Kant, who contrasted it with the noumenon, which ''cannot'' be directly observed. Kant was heavily influenced by Gottfried ...
that is believed to foretell the future, often signifying the advent of change. It was commonly believed in ancient times, and still believed by some today, that omens bring divine messages from the gods. These omens include natural phenomena, for example an eclipse, abnormal
births Birth is the act or process of bearing or bringing forth offspring, also referred to in technical contexts as parturition. In mammals, the process is initiated by hormones which cause the muscular walls of the uterus to contract, expelling the ...
of animals (especially humans) and behaviour of the sacrificial lamb on its way to the slaughter. Specialists, known as diviners, variously existed to interpret these omens. They would also use an artificial method, for example, a clay model of a sheep liver, to communicate with their gods in times of crisis. They would expect a binary answer, either yes or no, favourable or unfavourable. They did these to predict what would happen in the future and to take action to avoid disaster. Though the word ''omen'' is usually devoid of reference to the change's nature, hence being possibly either "good" or "bad", the term is more often used in a foreboding sense, as with the word ''ominous''. The word comes from its
Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
equivalent , of otherwise uncertain origin.


Ancient Near East

The oldest source for this practice in the Ancient Near East came from Mesopotamian practice attested at the first half of the 2nd millennium BC. It was vigorously pursued by the Assyrian kings, Esarhaddon and his son, Ashurbanipal in the 7th century BC. Omens were interpreted by several methods—e.g., liver divination, lecanomancy, and
libanomancy Libanomancy (also known as livanomancy and knissomancy) is a divination primarily through observing and interpreting burning incense smoke, but which may include the way incense ash falls as well. Del Rio, Martín Anton''Investigations Into Magic.'' ...
. Hepatoscopy—observing irregularities and abnormalities of the entrails of a sacrificial sheep—was used in many royal services. Astrological omens were popular in Assyria in the 7th century BC. Diviners gained influence by interpreting omens and advising the king, Esarhaddon (681–669 BC), how to avoid some terrible fate. Sometimes the Assyrian king hid for a while after he put a substitute king on the throne. The court expected that the substitute king would take the evil consequences of an omen. When they believed the danger was over, they executed the substitute king and the true king resumed the throne. The observations of omens were recorded into series. Some of them dated back to the first half of the 2nd millennium BC, and these were arranged as conditional statement later (if such and such is the case, then such and such is the result). This belief of omens later spread out around the Near East and beyond when clay models of sheep livers used for the diviners to learn the craft was found in Boghazkoi, Ugarit, Megiddo, and Hazor. Letters from the city Mari dated at the latest from the 18th century showed that these divinatory practices were not limited to the royal court, but also played an important role in everyday life of the people.


Ancient Greece

An (omen) was defined in antiquity as the carnivorous vulture, especially a prophetic bird. By careful observation of the bird's cries and the way or direction it flew, the augurs attempted to predict the future. They also saw lightning or thunder as omens, sent from Zeus, and observed the direction in which they saw or heard them. Omens represented the divine will and the decisions of the gods, their positioning opposite human endeavors, and were aimed at being understood by sensitive receivers of the time, who brought the divine charisma to become intermediaries, channels between the world of gods and humans. Even since Homeric times, the Greeks paid special attention to these signs: when they saw vultures from the left, another symbol of Zeus, they considered it a bad omen. The cry of a heron or lightning to the right marked positive and promising omen. In the Greek territory, seers also judged good and bad omens from the unwillingness or willingness of a victim to approach the altar and by the state of its offal when slaughtered.Lampsas Giannis, Dictionary of the Ancient World (Lexiko tou Archaiou Kosmou), Vol. I, Athens, Domi Publications, 1984, pp. 43–44.


Ancient Rome

In ancient Roman religion,
augurs An augur was a priest and official in the classical Roman world. His main role was the practice of augury, the interpretation of the will of the gods by studying the flight of birds. Determinations were based upon whether they were flying in ...
interpreted the flights of birds to ascertain the will of the gods, in response to specific questions. Their system was complex; for example, while a bird-sign on the left was usually favourable (auspicious) and one on the right unfavourable (inauspicious), the combination of a raven on the right and a crow on the left was favourable. Augurs also studied the behaviour of domesticated, sacred chickens before embarking on important enterprises, such as a senatorial meeting, the passage of a new law, or a battle. These formal "divine consultations" by augurs are known as "taking the auspices".
Haruspices In the religion of ancient Rome, a haruspex (plural haruspices; also called aruspex) was a person trained to practise a form of divination called haruspicy (''haruspicina''), the inspection of the entrails ('' exta''—hence also extispicy ...
examined the liver, lungs and entrails of animals sacrifice to interpret the will of the gods, again in response to clear and specific proposals. Some omens came in the form of prodigies – unnatural, aberrant or unusual phenomena such as meteor showers, hermaphrodite births, or "
blood rain Blood rain is a phenomenon where blood is perceived to fall from the sky in the form of rain. Blood Rain may also refer to: * ''Blood Rain'' (film), a 2005 thriller film * ''Blood Rain'' (novel), a 1999 crime novel See also *''BloodRayne'', a ...
", any of which could signify that the gods had somehow been angered. The meaning and import of reported prodigies were officially debated and decided by the
Roman senate The Roman Senate ( la, Senātus Rōmānus) was a governing and advisory assembly in ancient Rome. It was one of the most enduring institutions in Roman history, being established in the first days of the city of Rome (traditionally founded in ...
, with advice from religious experts. Threatening signs could then be officially expiated and the gods placated with the appropriate sacrifice and rituals. The interpretation and expiation of omens that suggested a threat to the State was a serious business. In 217 BC the consul Gaius Flaminius "disregarded his horse's collapse, the chickens, and yet other omens, before his disaster at Lake Trasimene". Certain natural events, particularly lightning strikes and thunder, could be ominous for the public or state, or only for the individual who saw or heard them. When a thunderclap interrupted his election as consul, Marcellus gave up his candidacy. Thereafter he travelled in an enclosed litter when on important business, to avoid sight of any bad omens that might affect his plans. Many Romans believed that particular words, phrases or incidents might carry prophetic content aimed at particular individuals who witnessed or heard them. Such "private" omens could be accepted, and their benefits secured (or their threat averted) by use of countersigns, or verbal formulas such as ("I accept the omen, I hold to it"); the consul L Aemilius Paullus, when about to embark on his campaign against King Perseus, heard his daughter say that her dog Persa had died; given the similarity of the names and the death of the dog, he took this as a sign that Perseus would be defeated – which he was. The orator and statesman
Cicero Marcus Tullius Cicero ( ; ; 3 January 106 BC – 7 December 43 BC) was a Roman statesman, lawyer, scholar, philosopher, and academic skeptic, who tried to uphold optimate principles during the political crises that led to the esta ...
, though an augur himself, and apparently convinced that in capable hands, it offered a reliable means of foretelling the future, was skeptical of unsolicited, personal omens. He reports the story that Licinius Crassus took ship for Syria despite the ominous call of a fig-seller – ("Caunean figs!"), which might be heard as ("Beware, don't go!") – and was killed on campaign. Cicero saw these events as merely coincidental; only the credulous could think them ominous. In Suetonius's "Lives of the Caesars", the deaths of various emperors are presaged by omens and dreams; the emperor Caligula, for example, dreamt that he stood before the throne of
Jupiter Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and the largest in the Solar System. It is a gas giant with a mass more than two and a half times that of all the other planets in the Solar System combined, but slightly less than one-thousandth t ...
, king of the gods, and Jupiter kicked him down from heaven to earth; Caligula ignored the premonition and was assassinated the next day.


Astrology

In the field of
astrology Astrology is a range of divinatory practices, recognized as pseudoscientific since the 18th century, that claim to discern information about human affairs and terrestrial events by studying the apparent positions of celestial objects. Di ...
, solar and lunar
eclipses An eclipse is an astronomical event that occurs when an astronomical object or spacecraft is temporarily obscured, by passing into the shadow of another body or by having another body pass between it and the viewer. This alignment of three ce ...
(along with the appearance of
comet A comet is an icy, small Solar System body that, when passing close to the Sun, warms and begins to release gases, a process that is called outgassing. This produces a visible atmosphere or coma, and sometimes also a tail. These phenomena ...
s and to some extent the
full moon The full moon is the lunar phase when the Moon appears fully illuminated from Earth's perspective. This occurs when Earth is located between the Sun and the Moon (when the ecliptic longitudes of the Sun and Moon differ by 180°). This means ...
) have often been considered omens of notable
births Birth is the act or process of bearing or bringing forth offspring, also referred to in technical contexts as parturition. In mammals, the process is initiated by hormones which cause the muscular walls of the uterus to contract, expelling the ...
,
death Death is the irreversible cessation of all biological functions that sustain an organism. For organisms with a brain, death can also be defined as the irreversible cessation of functioning of the whole brain, including brainstem, and brain ...
s, or other significant events throughout history in many societies. One Biblical example is the
Magi Magi (; singular magus ; from Latin '' magus'', cf. fa, مغ ) were priests in Zoroastrianism and the earlier religions of the western Iranians. The earliest known use of the word ''magi'' is in the trilingual inscription written by Darius t ...
in the
Gospel of Matthew The Gospel of Matthew), or simply Matthew. It is most commonly abbreviated as "Matt." is the first book of the New Testament of the Bible and one of the three synoptic Gospels. It tells how Israel's Messiah, Jesus, comes to his people and form ...
; in the Nativity narrative of the Gospel of Matthew, the Magi are depicted as predicting the birth of
Jesus Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label= Hebrew/ Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religiou ...
after seeing the
Star of Bethlehem The Star of Bethlehem, or Christmas Star, appears in the nativity story of the Gospel of Matthew chapter 2 where "wise men from the East" (Magi) are inspired by the star to travel to Jerusalem. There, they meet King Herod of Judea, and ask hi ...
.


Good or bad

Omens may be considered either good or bad depending on their interpretation. The same sign may be interpreted differently by different people or different cultures. For example, a superstition in the United States and other countries across
Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a subcontinent of Eurasia and it is located entirel ...
indicates that a black cat is an omen of bad luck.
Comets A comet is an icy, small Solar System body that, when passing close to the Sun, warms and begins to release gases, a process that is called outgassing. This produces a visible atmosphere or coma, and sometimes also a tail. These phenomena ar ...
also have been considered both good and bad omens.
Halley's Comet Halley's Comet or Comet Halley, officially designated 1P/Halley, is a short-period comet visible from Earth every 75–79 years. Halley is the only known short-period comet that is regularly visible to the naked eye from Earth, and thus the on ...
was a "bad omen" for King Harold II of England but a "good omen" for
William the Conqueror William I; ang, WillelmI (Bates ''William the Conqueror'' p. 33– 9 September 1087), usually known as William the Conqueror and sometimes William the Bastard, was the first House of Normandy, Norman List of English monarchs#House of Norman ...
.


See also

* * * * * * * * *


References

{{Authority control Divination Prophecy History of astrology Superstitions