Hippomancy is the art of divination through the horse, whether it involves interpreting the animal's movements or neighing, the tracks it leaves, or its bones. Throughout much of history, the horse was seen as an intermediary between Man, Nature, and the gods. The horse was thought to have diviner or oracle powers, often as part of cults.
According to Georges Dumézil, hippomancy was widespread among Indo-Europeans in very early antiquity. Documents and testimonies refer to Romans, Persians, Celts, Germanic, and Slavic peoples. Germanic and Slavic hippomancy rituals have many points in common, in particular the sacralization of a horse that is exceptional in terms of size and coat, and that lives near a sanctuary. These rituals were opposed by Christian evangelists in the Middle Ages. Most hippomancy cults disappeared.
Today, hippomancy still plays a role in dream interpretation. The vision of omens in the attitude of a horse and the belief in its power of divination remain commonplace, particularly in the countryside of Germanic countries during the 19th century, in Central Asia, and in the Ozarks mountains in the United States today. The lucky charm attributed to the horseshoe could be linked to hippomancy.
Etymology and definition
The term "hippomancy" comes from the Greek hippos, meaning "horse", and manteia, meaning "divination",(fr) J. B. Morin and Jean Baptiste Gaspard d'Ansse de Villoison, Dictionnaire étymologiques des mots françois dérivés du grec, vol. 1, Imprimerie impériale, 1809, 2nd ed. (read online archive), p. 447. which gave rise to mancie in Old French and Middle English.Clifford A. Pickover, Dreaming the Future : The Fantastic Story of Prediction, Prometheus Books, 2001, 452 p. (), p. 49. The CNRTL defines hippomancy as "divination by the neighing and movements of sacred horses".Lexicographical archive and etymological archive information for "Hippomancie" (meaning http://www.cnrtl.fr/definition/hippomancie archive) in the Trésor de la langue française informatisé, on the website of the Centre national de ressources textuelles et lexicales. More generally, The Encyclopedia of Divination describes it as "the observation of the actions of a horse followed by their interpretation as an omen of the future".Buckland 2003, p. 244. For Marc-André Wagner, hippomancy in the strict sense of the word must be ritualized and stems from a vision of the horse as a messenger animal for divinities or other higher powers.Wagner 2006, p. 95. In its broader sense, it also includes the interpretation of bones (osteomancy), dreams, and even objects associated with the animal, such as horseshoes. Those who practice hippomancy are known as "hippomancers".(fr) Académie française, Dictionnaire de l'Académie Française : Supplément, vol. 3, Paris, Didot, 1836, 6e éd. (read online archive). Hippomancy can involve a variety of divination techniques, including the interpretation of footprints(fr) "Vers une maîtrise du temps", on Raymond Réant, Pouvoirs étranges d'un clairvoyant (online book), Exergue, 2014 (). or parts of a horse's body, such as the skull.Wagner 2005, p. 169. According to Marc-André Wagner, the appearance of the horse in a dream, as in reality, gives rise to a variety of interpretations, both positive and negative.Wagner 2005, p. 166.
History Most ancient historians attribute importance to the prescience of horses,Wagner 2005, p. 170. and hippomancy was widely practiced in the Indo-European area until the Middle Ages. The most common form involves a live horse, while scapulimancy is much rarer.Wagner 2006, p. 98. Most of the time, hippomancy involves a human interpretation of the horse's movements. It also happens -much more rarely- in certain mythological tales and stories, that horses themselves speak to prophecy. The theme of the talking horse, which probably originated in animism, is not always linked to hippomancy.Wagner 2005, p. 179. The horse's head is particularly important as an instrument of divination. These ritual practices were opposed by Christianity.Wagner 2005, p. 172.
On Greek and Roman times
While the ancient Greeks seem to have been unaware of ritual hippomancy, Latin sources attest to the importance the Romans attached to equine predictions, particularly in the context of warfare.Wagner 2005, p. 173. The Romans' defeat at the hands of the Parthians was predicted by the behaviour of Crassus'(fr) "Crassus" on Plutarque, Vies parallèles read online archive, 19, 5. horse and that of Lucius Caesennius Paetus,(fr) Tacitus, Annales read online archive, XV, 7. which were said to have bolted when crossing the Euphrates. In Virgil's Aeneid, Anchises sees four white horses grazing and interprets this as an omen of war, adding that peace is still possible because horses can harness themselves to a chariot and be docile.(fr) Virgile, Énéide read online archive, Book II, v. 537. According to the same work, Carthage was founded on the site where the exiles of Tyre unearthed a horse skull at the suggestion of Juno, a sign of war victories and abundance for centuries to come.(fr) Virgile, Énéide read online archive, Book I, v. 441–445. Cicero mentions the horse in his treatise on divination, citing the Second Punic War. Gaius Flaminius is said to have fallen senselessly with his horse in front of a statue of Jupiter Stator, sparking the suspicion of his troops, who saw this as a bad omen and asked him not to engage in combat. He took no notice of this and sought the opinion of his pullary (divination by sacred chickens), who confirmed his troops' fears. He went into battle anyway but died and his army was defeated by Hannibal.(fr) Cicero, De divinatione read online archive I, 35 (77). In the Iliad, Achilles' horses Balius and Xanthus are gifted with prophetic speech. When Achilles returns to battle, determined to avenge Patroclus, Xanthe lowers his head and lets his mane hang down, while Hera has just endowed him with human speech. He announces that he can do nothing to change Achilles' fate, reminding him of his imminent death at the hands of "a God and a man".(fr) Homer, Iliade read online archive, XIX, 404–416. However, this case of a horse speaking to prophecy is very rare.Wagner 2006, p. 96.
The Greco-Latin sources about Alexander the Great, particularly Plutarch and the Novel of Alexander,(fr) "Vie d'Alexandre" on Plutarque, Vies parallèles read online archive, 6, 5–8. present Bucephalus as a monstrous anthropophagous horse, with a Pythia predicting that only Alexander would be able to ride it. The pseudo-Callisthenes version recounts that Bucephalus, accustomed to feeding on human flesh, neighed softly when he saw Alexander, recognizing him as his master.(fr) Pseudo-Callisthène, Le Roman d'Alexandre, I, 15, 1. This is a combination of hippomancy and the common theme of the untamable horse that can only be mastered by a great conqueror.Wagner 2005, p. 178. Horses are also capable of predicting the death of monarchs: according to Suetonius, the horses freed by Julius Caesar behind the Rubicon stopped feeding and shed tears before their master died.(fr) Suetonius, César, 81.
On persian times Herodotus and Ctesias attest to hippomancy among the Persians, where it continued until the Sassanid era.(fr) Christine Ferlampin-Acher, Fées, bestes et luitons : croyances et merveilles dans les romans français en prose (xiiie – xive siècles), Presses Paris Sorbonne, 2002, 513 p. (, read online archive), p. 144-145. Georges Dumézil sees it as a possible Indo-European rite of enthronement.Dumézil 1984.(fr) Georges Dumézil, "Hérodote et l'intronisation de Darius", on L'oubli de l'Homme et l'honneur des Dieux, Paris, 1985, p. 246-253. It reflects the great importance of the horse in Persian thought (the future Iranians),Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones, King and Court in Ancient Persia 559 to 331 BCE, Oxford University Press, 2013, 272 p. (, read online archive), Rech. "Hippomancy" online book. and perhaps the role of diviner accorded to military riders.Garrett G. Fagan and Matthew Freeman Trundle, New Perspectives on Ancient Warfare, vol. 59 of History of Warfare, Leiden, the Netherlands/Boston, BRILL, 2010, 372 p. (, read online archive), p. 143-144. However, Persian hippomancy was also part of the first Indo-European tripartite function, kingship.Wagner 2005, p. 175. According to the Histories of Herodotus in the 6th century BC, Darius exploited the Persians' belief in hippomancy to ensure his royal legitimacy: the six nobles decided to let fate decide who would be king, declaring that whoever's horse was the first to neigh at sunrise would be made king of the Persians. Darius (or his groom) used a ruse to get his stallion to neigh first. After his accession to power, he had a bas-relief engraved with an inscription saying that he owed his kingship to the merit of his horse and that of his squire Oibares.(fr) Herodoto, Histoires read online archive, III. It is possible that the motif of hippomancy was added at a later date to the story of Darius' accession to power (or misunderstood by the Greeks), because it fits in with the vision he wanted to impose, that of the chosen one of the divinity Ahura Mazda.(fr) Pierre Briant, "L'arrivée au pouvoir de Darius : De Cyrus à Alexandre", in Histoire de l'Empire perse, Fayard, coll. "Biographies Historiques", 1996 (). It is also possible that Darius really did use this ruse, or propagated the story to appease his people, who believed it.Wagner 2005, p. 176, quoting Michel Mourre, Dictionnaire encyclopédique d'Histoire, 1996.
Greco-Roman sources place particular emphasis on this hippomancy ritual, and on the ruse that enabled Darius the Great to rise to power.(de) Marie-Pierre Arnaud Lindet, "Le liber Memorialis de L. Ampelius" on Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt (ANRW): Geschichte und Kultur Roms im Spiegel der neueren Forschung. Principat. Sprache und Literatur. Einzelne Autoren seit der hadrianischen Zeit und Allgemeines zur Literatur des 2. und 3. Jahrhunderts (Forts.), Part 2, volume 34, Walter de Gruyter, 1997, (), p. 2309.
On celtic times Hippomancy also seems to have been practiced by the Celtic peoples of antiquity: Collin de Plancy, in his Dictionnaire Infernal, refers to Celtic hippomancy as a form of divination based on the neighing and movement of white horses, which were fed and kept in consecrated forests and considered to be the guardians of divine secrets.(fr) Collin de Plancy, Dictionnaire infernal, Slatkine editions, 1993, p. 336. The Celts considered movements of the horse's head, spontaneous prancing, and starting with the right or left front leg to be significant.
There is indirect evidence that the Celts practiced hippomancy. In his two Vitae, Claude Sterckx notes the presence of horses that cause the death of impious warriors who have defied divine power after a saint's prediction, notably in the story of Neachtan.(fr) Claude Sterckx, "Guerriers impies et chevaux ominaux dans l'hagiographie celte" on Ollodagos, III, 3, 1992, p. 185-192. However, these horses do not prophecy directly.Wagner 2005, p. 544. In the Vita of Saint Columba, a white horse is informed of the saint's impending death. This theme reveals the presence of an earlier archaic belief.Wagner 2005, p. 545.
On germanic and scandinavian times