__notoc__ Petosiris to Nechepso is a letter describing an ancient divination technique using

numerology Numerology (also known as arithmancy) is the belief in an occult, divine or mystical relationship between a number and one or more coinciding events. It is also the study of the numerical value, via an alphanumeric system, of the letters in ...

and a diagram. It is likely to be a

pseudepigraph Pseudepigrapha (also anglicized as "pseudepigraph" or "pseudepigraphs") are falsely attributed works, texts whose claimed author is not the true author, or a work whose real author attributed it to a figure of the past.Bauckham, Richard; "Pseu ...

Petosiris Petosiris ( grc, Πετόσιρις), called Ankhefenkhons, was the high priest of Thoth at Hermopolis and held various priestly degrees in the service of Sakhmet, Khnum, Amen-Re and Hathor. Petosiris was the son of Sishu and Nefer- renpet. ...

and Nechepso are considered to be the founders 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 ...

in some traditions. One translation of this letter into Latin is attributed to

Saint Bede Bede ( ; ang, Bǣda , ; 672/326 May 735), also known as Saint Bede, The Venerable Bede, and Bede the Venerable ( la, Beda Venerabilis), was an English monk at the monastery of St Peter and its companion monastery of St Paul in the Kingdom o ...

, and can be found in

Cotton Tiberius This is an incomplete list of some of the manuscripts from the Cotton library that today form the Cotton collection of the British Library. Some manuscripts were destroyed or damaged in a fire at Ashburnham House in 1731, and a few are kept in oth ...

. The technique is known by several names, including the Petosiris Circle, the Sphere of

Apuleius Apuleius (; also called Lucius Apuleius Madaurensis; c. 124 – after 170) was a Numidian Latin-language prose writer, Platonist philosopher and rhetorician. He lived in the Roman province of Numidia, in the Berber city of Madauros, modern- ...

, Columcille's Circle, and

Democritus Democritus (; el, Δημόκριτος, ''Dēmókritos'', meaning "chosen of the people"; – ) was an Ancient Greek pre-Socratic philosopher from Abdera, primarily remembered today for his formulation of an atomic theory of the universe. ...

's Sphere. The attribution of ancient authors is a typical practice of

Neoplatonism and Gnosticism Gnosticism refers to a collection of religious groups originating in Jewish religiosity in Alexandria in the first few centuries CE. Filoramo, Giovanni (1990). ''A History of Gnosticism''. Blackwell. pp. 142-7 Neoplatonism is a school of Hellenis ...

, and the technique may arise from this tradition. Examples of the figure are known from Anglo-Saxon manuscripts. The technique involves calculating the numerical value of a patient's name, then dividing by 30 or 29, a number derived from the

lunar month In lunar calendars, a lunar month is the time between two successive syzygies of the same type: new moons or full moons. The precise definition varies, especially for the beginning of the month. Variations In Shona, Middle Eastern, and Europ ...

to find the remainder, which is (mod 29) or (mod 30) in

modular arithmetic In mathematics, modular arithmetic is a system of arithmetic for integers, where numbers "wrap around" when reaching a certain value, called the modulus. The modern approach to modular arithmetic was developed by Carl Friedrich Gauss in his bo ...

. The number is then found on the diagram, to determine the

prognosis Prognosis (Greek: πρόγνωσις "fore-knowing, foreseeing") is a medical term for predicting the likely or expected development of a disease, including whether the signs and symptoms will improve or worsen (and how quickly) or remain stabl ...

References

Bibliography

* Fuentes González, Pedro Pablo, �
Néchepso-Pétosiris
��, in R. Goulet (ed.), ''Dictionnaire des Philosophes Antiques'', vol. IV, Paris, CNRS, 2005, p. 601-615.

External links

Magic (supernatural) Numerology Occult texts History of Catholicism in England {{occult-stub

See also

References

Bibliography

External links