Word.ws English Dictionary

alphitomancy

alphitomancy noun: an Ancient Greek method of divination using barley meal, used for instance to reveal guilty parties; it entailed feeding a person or group barley meal, and judging those who felt no effects to be innocent, while judging those who felt indigestion to be guilty.

Noun

alphitomancy (uncountable)

  1. An Ancient Greek method of divination using barley meal, used for instance to reveal guilty parties; it entailed feeding a person or group barley meal, and judging those who felt no effects to be innocent, while judging those who felt indigestion to be guilty.
    • Aleuromancy and alphitomancy were almost analogous processes; cakes were made of wheat or barley flour which could not be swallowed by anyone guilty of a given misdeed.1931, Lock translating de Givry Picture Museum of Sorcery

Origin of alphitomancy

From Ancient Greek ἀλφῐτόμαντις (alphĭtómantis, “diviner who used barley meal”), from ἄλφῐτον (álphĭton, “barley meal”) and μαντεία (manteía, “prophecy”).

Questions about alphitomancy

What does alphitomancy mean?
Alphitomancy means an Ancient Greek method of divination using barley meal, used for instance to reveal guilty parties; it entailed feeding a person or group barley meal, and judging those who felt no effects to be innocent, while judging those who felt indigestion to be guilty.
What part of speech is alphitomancy?
Alphitomancy is a noun.

Words near alphitomancy in the dictionary

  1. Alpheus
  2. Alpheus Valley
  3. alphin
  4. Alphington
  5. alphins
  6. alphitomancy
  7. alphoid
  8. alphol
  9. Alphonse
  10. Alphonse and Gaston
  11. Alphonsian

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: alphitomancy (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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