Vejovis ~ Haruspicy ~ Divination ~ Rome ~ Bath, England.

At the foot of Wikipedia's page for 7 March it's noted that this day is "one of the days dedicated to Vejovis (Roman Empire)". The other two days dedicated to Vejovis were 1 January and 21 May.

Curiosity sent me on a Googling trip.

The original significance of Vejovis has become increasingly hazy over the centuries. He was considered by Romans to be a god of healing, and associated with the Greek Asclepius. There has, though, been constant tweaking of his significance and use by the people. Also connected to his name: escaping from netherworld, Volcanic God responsible for marshland and earthquakes, guardian angel in charge of slaves and fighters refusing to lose. God of deceivers, called to protect right causes and to give pain and deception to enemies. He has been identified with Apollo, with the infant Jupiter, and the Anti-Jupiter, which could be suggested by his name. Aulus Gellius observed that the ve- that prefixes the name also appears in Latin words such as vesanus = insane, so interprets Vejovis as the anti- or opposite of Jove

A multi-tasking god for all seasons then?

Vejovis has usually been depicted as a youth holding a laurel wreath and arrows, standing next to a goat. A temple between the two peaks of the Capitoline Hill in Rome was dedicated to him.

An intetrpretation marked as "dubious" interested me most. Vejovis may be based on the Etruscan god of vendetta, known to them by the name Vetis written on the Piacenza Liver, a bronze model used in haruspical divination.

Forget Vejovis, what the heck was haruspical divination ?

See lines from T.S. Eliot's The Four Quartets: The Dry Salvages

To communicate with Mars, converse with spirits,
To report the behaviour of the sea monster,
Describe the horoscope, haruspicate or scry,
Observe disease in signatures, evoke
Biography from the wrinkles of the palm
And tragedy from fingers; release omens
By sortilege, or tea leaves, riddle the inevitable
With playing cards, fiddle with pentagrams
Or barbituric acids, or dissect
The recurrent image into pre-conscious terrors—
To explore the womb, or tomb, or dreams; all these are usual
Pastimes and drugs, and features of the press:
And always will be, some of them especially
When there is distress of nations and perplexity
Whether on the shores of Asia, or in the Edgware Road.

It was haruspex Spurinna who warned Julius Caesar to beware the Ides of March.


E-notes tells us:

In Roman and Etruscan religious practice, a haruspex (plural haruspices; Latin auspex, plural auspices) was a man trained to practice a form of divination called haruspicy, hepatoscopy or hepatomancy.

Haruspicy is the inspection of the entrails of sacrificed animals, especially the livers of sacrificed sheep and poultry. The rites were paralleled by other rites of divination such as the interpretation of lightning strikes, of the flight of birds (augury), and of other natural omens.

Haruspicy is not original to Etruscans nor Romans, but considered to have originated from the Near East.

The Nineveh library texts name more than a dozen liver-related terms and before cuneiform writing was even deciphered, hints of the existence of Babylonian hepatoscopy were recorded in the Bible. One Babylonian clay model of a sheep's liver, dated between 2050 and 1750 BC, is conserved in the British Museum. The model was used for omen divination which was important to Mesopotamian medicine. This study was carried out by priests and seers who looked for signs in the stars, or in the organs of sacrificed animals, to tell them things about a patient’s illness. Wooden pegs were placed in the holes of the clay tablet to record features found in a sacrificed animal's liver. The priest or seer then used these features to predict the course of a patient's illness.

This, then, is where Vejovis could have picked up the connection to Asclepius and medicine.

Evidence has been found of haruspicy in Bath, England where words engraved on the base of a long-gone statue show a haruspex honouring a goddess.

(The inscription reveals that the stone was set up by L. Marcius Memor, a haruspex, who was a special kind of priest for whom no other parallel is known from Roman Britain. It was dedicated to the goddess Sulis Minerva and is likely to have supported a statue of her. See more on the stone HERE. )

Wednesday Woo-Woo ~ OUIJA

What lies behind the purpose of a Ouija Board is definitive "woo". Contacting spirits of the dead links to lots of other woo-ish bits and pieces: ghosts, past lives, divination, prodigies....and on.

Having never used the device myself, I can't vouch for its efficacy or otherwise. My delving into woo stops short at astrology and tarot these days, I only do what I'm drawn to do. When younger I did experiment with spiritualism by attending a few spiritualist meetings and churches, but didn't continue along that route. I'm not a complete skeptic when it comes to Ouija, just a curious bystander who has never been drawn to experiment.

In its current style the Ouija Board originated in the late 19th century, in the USA. It was, however, an extension of a much older tradition of contacting spirits of the dead. Such tradition has reportedly been traced back to China, centuries before the birth of Confucius (circa 550 B.C.E.). Fu Chi or Fuji, an accepted form of Chinese spirit writing, is what's known in the west as automatic writing. Spirits were thought to guide a pen or stick, in sand or on paper, to form letters or glyphs. Some have tried to make a link from Ouija Boards to ancient Greece, and Pythagorus, but that idea seems to have been discredited.




We can safely say that it was an upsurge in spiritualism and theosophy in late 19th century USA that led to the spread of "talking boards". There's some evidence, though disputed, that a Maryland cabinet/ coffin maker, E.C. Reiche (or Reichie?) , designed and constructed the first board that came to be known by the name Ouija. He is said to have sold the rights of manufacture to Charles Kennard; the first patent was filed in 1890. These days rights to The Ouija Board are held by Parker Brothers who acquired them in 1960 - just in time for a New Age/hippie era?

The Ouija Board has acquired some particularly bad press, notably after the 1973 movie The Exorcist which many wrongly thought was based on a true story. Ouija has long been labelled a "tool of the devil" by certain factions. It's certainly a tool, but a tool for what purpose is up to its user. You can use a hammer in constructing a useful piece of furniture - or you could use it to kill or maim another living creature. Intent is key. Having said that, I don't consider it wise for young people to dabble in Ouija Board use. While I do not believe in demons or anything akin to demons, we don't know whether impressionable minds, fed these days more than ever with tales of horror, violence, war, vampires, and such could conjure up something harmful via their own consciousness. If Ouija Boards and similar methods of divination work on any level at all, we have still to discover how. Until this is known, it's best to tread lightly.

How to link astrology to a post on Ouija isn't clear. The businessmen who initiated bulk manufacture and sale of the boards were interested mainly, or only, in profit. I doubt they had any serious interest in the spread of occult learning or experience. Perhaps E.C. Reiche, if his part in Ouija's history is true, was the most likely of them all to have had a true interest in the occult.

Searching for birth data on E.C. Reiche I found it on this site. Born 27 December 1831, died 6 January 1899.

Curiosity led me to look at a natal chart, using as location the town in which he lived (probably born there): Chestertown, Maryland, chart set for 12 noon. How appropriate it'd be if he actually had been born around noon! Pluto, planet of the occult and hidden things, secrets, darkness, etc. sits on the ascendant angle - the strongest point in a natal chart. But chances are he wasn't born around noon.




Anyway, I still see this chart as a good fit for a craftsman who had an interest in occult matters. His Sun was in Capricorn, which I think of as a craftsman/businessman sign. Neptune conjunct Mercury also in Capricorn: creativity, illusion and/or psychic ability married with his planet of communication. Uranus is unadulterated in its home sign, Aquarius along with Jupiter, adding a good helping of inventive talent to the mix.

From New World Encyclopedia:

Whether one believes that the Ouija contacts spirits or is merely a vehicle to probe one's own subconscious, there are psychological risks to using the board. During Ouija sessions, it is common to receive vulgar or vile messages, as well as messages that tap into the users' fear of death. These messages can be highly disturbing to some, no matter what their source, and have the potential to exacerbate any existing mental disturbances. It is well advised that those with emotional or psychological disturbances refrain from the use of the Ouija.