The ''Sortes Astrampsychi'' (''Oracles of Astrampsychus'') was a popular

Greco-Roman The Greco-Roman world , also Greco-Roman civilization, Greco-Roman culture or Greco-Latin culture (spelled Græco-Roman or Graeco-Roman in British English), as understood by modern scholars and writers, includes the geographical regions and co ...

fortune-telling Fortune telling is the spiritual practice of predicting information about a person's life. Melton, J. Gordon. (2008). ''The Encyclopedia of Religious Phenomena''. Visible Ink Press. pp. 115–116. The scope of fortune telling is in principle ...

guide ascribed to Astrampsychus, identified by ancient authors as a

magus Magi (), or magus (), is the term for priests in Zoroastrianism and earlier Iranian religions. The earliest known use of the word ''magi'' is in the trilingual inscription written by Darius the Great, known as the Behistun Inscription. Old Per ...

who lived in Persia before the conquest of

Alexander the Great Alexander III of Macedon (; 20/21 July 356 BC – 10/11 June 323 BC), most commonly known as Alexander the Great, was a king of the Ancient Greece, ancient Greek kingdom of Macedonia (ancient kingdom), Macedon. He succeeded his father Philip ...

, or an Egyptian sage serving a

Ptolemaic Ptolemaic is the adjective formed from the name Ptolemy, and may refer to: Pertaining to the Ptolemaic dynasty *Ptolemaic dynasty, the Macedonian Greek dynasty that ruled Egypt founded in 305 BC by Ptolemy I Soter *Ptolemaic Kingdom Pertaining t ...

king. While other sortes (means of fortune-telling) involved the casting of dice, the ''Sortes Astrampsychi'' did not. Instead, a questioner chose a prewritten question, to which a number was assigned; calling on divine inspiration, the questioner then spoke a number from one to ten, which was added to the question number; the oracle-monger then provided one of ten possible replies by consulting a numerical index. The text is known from thirteen papyrus fragments of the third to sixth centuries CE, and from

Byzantine The Byzantine Empire, also known as the Eastern Roman Empire, was the continuation of the Roman Empire centred on Constantinople during late antiquity and the Middle Ages. Having survived the events that caused the fall of the Western Roman E ...

manuscripts which date from the fourteenth to sixteenth centuries but are completely preserved. The Byzantine texts add Christian religious elements. In a preface to the ''Sortes'', the author, identifying himself as "Astrampsychus of Egypt" and addressing his remarks "to King Ptolemy," goes on to claim that the book was actually "an invention of

Pythagoras Pythagoras of Samos (; BC) was an ancient Ionian Greek philosopher, polymath, and the eponymous founder of Pythagoreanism. His political and religious teachings were well known in Magna Graecia and influenced the philosophies of P ...

the philosopher," and boasts that "King

Alexander Alexander () is a male name of Greek origin. The most prominent bearer of the name is Alexander the Great, the king of the Ancient Greek kingdom of Macedonia who created one of the largest empires in ancient history. Variants listed here ar ...

of Macedon ruled the world by using this method of deciding matters." A number of later treatises have been spuriously ascribed to Astrampsychus, including a book on healing donkeys, a guide for interpreting dreams, a discussion of

lapidary Lapidary () is the practice of shaping rock (geology), stone, minerals, or gemstones into decorative items such as cabochons, engraved gems (including cameo (carving), cameos), and faceted designs. A person who practices lapidary techniques of ...

stones for use in astrology, a work on geomancy, and a volume of love charms.Oberhelman, p. 11. The first English translation of the ''Sortes Astrampsychi'' by Stewart and Morrell was published in 1998 as "The Oracles of Astrampsychus" in ''Anthology of Ancient Greek Popular Literature''; the editor, William Hansen, provides an introduction with details about the history of the document and instructions for its use. In 2006 an edition of the Greek text with a German translation by Kai Brodersen was published as ''Astrampsychos: Das Pythagoras-Orakel''.

Notes

References

* Brodersen, Kai, 2006. ''Astrampsychos. Das Pythagoras-Orakel''. Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, Darmstadt. * Oberhelman, Steven M., 2008. ''Dreambooks in Byzantium: Six Oneirocritica in Translation, with Commentary and Introduction''. Aldershot, England; Burlington, VT: Ashgate. * Stewart, Randall and Kenneth Morrell, 1998. "The Oracles of Astrampsychus," pp. 285–324 in ''Anthology of Ancient Greek Popular Literature'', edited by William Hansen. Indiana Univ. Press. * van der Horst, Pieter W., 2010
Review
of ''Die'' Sortes Astrampsychi: ''Problemlösungsstrategien durch Orakel im römischen Ägypten'' by Franziska Naether. ''Bryn Mawr Classical Review'', 2010.08.43. * Clarysse, Willy, 2011
Review
of ''Die'' Sortes Astrampsychi: ''Problemlösungsstrategien durch Orakel im römischen Ägypten'' by Franziska Naether. ''The Bulletin of the American Society of Papyrologists'', vol. 8 (2011), pp. 293–5.

External links

* ttps://web.archive.org/web/20050316201830/http://www.isidore-of-seville.com/astdiv/astrampsychus.html Brief "Nautical Lapidary" ascribed to Astrampyschus Classical oracles Occult books {{occult-book-stub