haruspicy

English

Alternative forms

Etymology

From Latin haruspicium

Noun

haruspicy (countable and uncountable, plural haruspicies)

  1. The study and 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
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