The OED when citing Gaule 1652, adds the word 'divining' into the citation to make it read better. Following the principles of historical lexicography it places this added word in square brackets to alert the reader that the word did not appear in the original. It is a shame that it did not always follow this ideal so carefully, for the same word is added without the brackets into the fist citation for alphitomancy from the same section of Gaule.
This citation obviously contains an error in which Bessy wrongly couples together alectryomancy and alphitomancy, rather than alectromancy and alectryomancy.
In this citation it seems that Rich is stating that the Anglo-Saxon word corsnaed (not corsned as he has it) literally means cursed bread. Actually the etymology is rather from cor, a variant of cyre a choice + snaed a bit or piece. Thus, literally, a "piece of one's choice", a "trial piece".
Here Blount is stating that the word armomancy is a derivative of the New Latin armomancia. However, one must be cautious. In all likelihood there was no New Latin form of this word. In fact Blount gives such (hypothetical) roots for nearly all the ink-horn terms appearing in his "hard word" dictionary. It is a matter of course. Similarly Greek roots are listed where no Greek word is known to have been recorded.
I have no idea what the Gibsons mean when they write: "Any modern survival of such practices is probably computerized rather than divinatory." People are no longer sacrificed, but I guess they are from time to time inspected "physically". Still if the practice is in no way divinatory, then what are they getting at? That people nowadays are sometimes physically inspected by means of a computer? Are they talking about CAT-scanners? Is this meant to be a survival of armomancy? It remains a mystery.
Note Note Note The OED actually records 'coskiomancy' as one of the variant forms of coscinomancy, thus revealing that they relied on Brand's citing of the Athenian Oracle without actually checking that source themselves, for had they done they would have discovered that the actual form appearing in the Athenian Oracle is 'coskniomancy', which involves nothing more than an erroneous transposition of letters, and not a different form at all.
This word appears in the NED 1891 fasicle with the note ``Sir R. Burton believes that he found the words in some Eng. writer of the 17th c., and many scholars inform us that they have certainly met with them in earlier literature, but we have failed to obtain any references.'' However, it would seem that subsequently the `many scholars' came through, for in the emendations at the beginning of volume E (Vol III. Part ii. 1897) there is the note ``The form egremauncey occurs in a 1469 Gregory's Chron. (Camd. Soc. 1876), 183.'' and, further, in volume N (1906 fasicle) there is a note at the headword `necromancy' which says ``In Merlin (c1450) pp. 375 and 508 the form egramauncye occurs; for an archaic 19th c. example see Egromancy.'' Neither of these Middle English instances were put into the 1933 supplement. Nor did Burchfield include them in the 1970s supplements (OEDS). However, Burton's purported 17th c. citation does not appear to have been ascertained. In the so-called `Second Edition' (OED2) the two Middle English references are justly placed at the appropriate headword, after languishing around in ``notes'' for over half a century. Sadly the editors did not see the need to actually seek out the references and put in the full citations for the Middle English forms.
The New Sydenham Society's Lexicon, for instance, lists: halochymia, -deræum, -gen, -genium, -genous, -graphy, -olgy, -meter, -philous, etc.


The common belief that lexicographers place phoney words or definitions in their dictionaries in order to catch other lexicographers plagiarising their work is not true. Most lexicographers will admit that they have too much trouble trying to eliminate "real" mistakes to actually bother intentionally concocting phoney ones. Though, apparently false entries are slipped into biographical dictionaries for this purpose.
Early dictionaries did copy one another shamelessly, but by the 19th century practice had changed, and instead, dictionaries actually cited earlier dictionaries as 'authorities'. This can be seen in numerous citations in this work where after a definition appears an italicised name.
This entry is typical of the lack of careful scholarship common to many popular books on magic, witchcraft, and New Age subjects. Not only does the definition conflate two entirely separate divinations (i.e. cleidomancy and cledonomancy), but it even misspells the suffix! Note also that this is meant to be the revised edition. Such sloppy work and editing serve to point out that such books must really be read with a critical and somewhat skeptical eye.
In word Dict. at the end of Johnson's entry signifies that Johnson was not certain that this word was "read in any book but the works of lexicographers", and is to be "considered as resting only upon the credit of former dictionaries".
Imp. dict suppl. gives the entry: ar'rithmancy or arith'mancy. - a note on the pron.
The term numerology is known only from the early 20th century. It was first used by the famous astrologer 'Sephirial' (W.R. Old).
I could not find in Liddel & Scott the palomanteia mentioned by Smedley...perhaps a mistake for 'pegomancy'.
The original meaning of hood-wink is here intended, i.e., to cover the eyes by placing a hood over the head; to blindfold.
During proofreading of the bromides of Macquarie Dict. 2nd ed. it was noticed by myself that the word 'lithium' was missing from the page - an error arising from a coding error in the database in the headword field. Naturally such an important word cannot be left out of a dictionary, and to make space 'lithomancy', and some other words were deleted, hence it does not appear in the 1991 edition.