Word.ws English Dictionary

cledonism

cledonism noun: divination through the interpretation of words (written or spoken) encountered by chance.

Noun

cledonism (uncountable)

  1. Divination through the interpretation of words (written or spoken) encountered by chance.
    • And indeed cledonism, or the putting of a prophetic sense on words spoken with another reference (John xi. 50 sq.) can never have been the business of a class of men (Jud. ix. 37, Jer. xxvii. 9, Micah v. 12), or been so marked a type of divination that Isaiah could speak of it as characteristically...1885, The Journal of Philology, volume XIV, page 117
    • We shall find Cledonism stereotyped and converted into palpable lots in the most perfected of the lottery methods, that which uses written speech, phrases designated by chance and applied to a given interrogation.1924 March, The Fortnightly Review, page 444
    Synonyms:
    cledonomancy

Synonyms of cledonism

Origin of cledonism

From Ancient Greek κληδών (klēdṓn, “an omen”) + -ism.

Questions about cledonism

What does cledonism mean?
Cledonism means divination through the interpretation of words (written or spoken) encountered by chance.
What part of speech is cledonism?
Cledonism is a noun.

Words near cledonism in the dictionary

  1. clecks
  2. CLECs
  3. Cleddau
  4. cledge
  5. cledgy
  6. cledonism
  7. cledonomancy
  8. cledonomantic
  9. Clee Hills
  10. Clee St Margaret
  11. Cleehill

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: cledonism (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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Cite this entry: “cledonism.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/cledonism. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.