From The Square of Sevens by Robert Antrobus, 1900.

From Wrangell Sentinel, Dec. 28, 1916.

From The Jolly Book of Funcraft by Patten Beard, 1918.

Etteila's method of fortune-telling by the Tarot.  From The Tarot Of The Bohemians by Papus, 1892.

"Fortune telling by inspecting the physiognomy."  From Researchers Into Chinese Superstitions by Henry Doré, 1917.

From Researchers Into Chinese Superstitions by Henry Doré, 1917.

From The Children's Newspaper, 1931.

From Pahlavi Cartomancy by S. A. and L. V. Moulton, 1904.

From The Owl King and Other Fairy Stories by Herbert Escott Inman and illustrated by E. A. Mason, 1898.

From Improvement Era, 1947.

We like that line, "She had started with tarot cards, but one was missing."  Perhaps she spread the deck face-up and, like a card sharp, instantly divined which card was conspicuous by its absence.  From Effigies by William K. Wells.

We're honored to have been featured on Eli Ro's podcast:

I have a book on Astragalomancy that I really like, Astragalomancy: A Loaded Guide: Intriguing Readings of 21 Discrete Dice Throws by Craig Conley and it’s a whole lot of history and some filler, to be honest, but it’s well-written and easy to follow and it is a straightforward guide to dice reading or bone reading. But there’s a bit in there that gives a really good overview ...

There is perhaps no better way to conjure up the spirit of great antiquity than to roll dice. The very ancient game of throwing knucklebones dates back to the Trojan War, if we are to take Sophocles’ word. The original knucklebone was technically a bone in a sheep’s ankle, the astragalus, hence divination by astragalomancy. The great Greek philosopher Plato traced dice even farther back, to the ibis-headed Egyptian god Thoth, inventor of magic and writing and science, divine arbitrator, judge of the dead, and maintainer of the universe. Plato himself played dice not only with cubes but also tetrahedrons, octahedrons, dodecahedrons, and icosahedrons-the famous “Platonic solids” of geometry. 

Plato said, “God geometrizes,” and that’s a key to why dice have always been associated with divination--the geometric solids, as building blocks of the universe, embody truths on higher planes. Over the centuries, several rules have been associated with throwing dice for divination. However, it is entirely a matter of personal choice whether these are followed or ignored. Many of these rules are arbitrary and were probably developed to add mystery and significance to divination by dice. Do not be afraid to develop your own guidelines, nor to be completely spontaneous, using the dice in different ways according to your instincts at the time. Trusting your instincts is the best way to get a good reading.

In other words, we can go through some common interpretations for certain dice throws and formations, but the more we do it, the more we can and should begin to interpret things using our own intuition and experiences. And that’s the truth for absolutely every kind of divination that we will ever do. The guidelines are just that; they’re guides. They are not the law. Our own sixth sense is always the authority, we should always trust our instincts when it conflicts with the so-called rules. 

From St. Nicholas magazine, 1916.

The highly rare Fortello Crystal Ball sold in 1953 for $4.95, which the inflation calculator says is more like $55 today.  Made of glass (approximately 5 inches in diameter) and filled with a thick black liquid, it was crafted by Larno Novelties of New York.  It worked like a Magic 8 Ball: when shaken and turned upside down, little playing cards inside the ball floated to the top to tell one's fortune.  Its full name was "Fortello: The Gypsy Crystal: A Fortune Telling Game."  We found a photo on an auction site of one owned by a magician.  The ads are from Mystic Magazine and Fate Magazine, 1954, when it had gone down in price to $3.75 (about $42 today).  Larno Novelties is itself so little known that we could find only a single ad mentioning them by name, for a lucky fishing lure.

It's like us waking up every morning: premonition, monition, telepathic communication, intuitive insight.  From a Rosicrucian ad, 1972.

The Book of Love wasn't Cupid's only publication.  Your Future by Cupid -- from the 1915 yearbook of the State Female Normal School, Farmville, Va.