Dictionary.com Word Of The Day
Mar. 14, 2017
arithmancy\AR-ith-man-see\noun
1. divination by the use of numbers, especially by the number of
letters in names. Alsoarithmomancy.
QuotesA correspondent who has charge of the arithmancy department of
this Magazine, and who is now engaged in constructing a system that
will enable us to calculate the periodicity of South American
revolutions, and the probable advent of what is called "early spring"
in New England, sends to the Drawer the following timely figures
bearing upon the immediate future of France ...
-- , "Editor's Drawer," Harper's Monthly Magazine June to November,
1883
Origin of arithmancyArithmancy, a kind of divination by numerology,
derives from the Greek nouns arithmósnumber, a number, amount and
manteía prophetic power, divination. The Greeks practiced (and
condemned) all sorts of divination, e.g., necromancy, the black art of
communicating with ghosts, as in the Odyssey and in the Bible when King
Saul consults the Witch of Endor in 1 Samuel; oneiromancy, the
interpretation of dreams (Aristotle);oracles (as at Delphi); and the
perennial astrology. In arithmancy numerical values were assigned to
the letters of the alphabet: A = 1, B = 2, etc. Words and especially
proper names converted into numbers had power, probably the most famous
being the number of the beast
666 in the New Testament book of the
Apocalypse (Revelation).Arithmancy entered English in the 16th
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