| 单词 | soothsayer |
| 例句 | soothsayer noun •the most respected of the king's soothsayers:seer, oracle, augur, prophet/prophetess, sage, prognosticator, diviner, fortune teller, crystal-gazer, clairvoyant, psychic | literary sibyl | rare haruspex.WORD NOTE haruspex In the age of bewilderment, when formal religions had not quite yet wholly seized the hearts and minds of the English-speaking people—roughly between the 12th and 16th centuries—much power was given to diviners of one kind or another, men and women who claimed to see signs—indications of future fortune—in a variety of commonplace objects and occurrences. Pessomancers, for example, looked for signs in the random arrangements of pebbles; capnomancers saw signs in smoke; metopomancers studied foreheads; onychomancers claimed to see heavenly indications in the growth of fingernails; and tyromancers found the future in pieces of cheese (for while tyro in Latin means "a young soldier" or more generally, "a beginner," in Greek it does indeed mean "cheese.") Ever eager that the language be littered with such words, both to keep the words themselves alive and the writings rich with color, I advocate rediscovering some of the more unusual of the breed, and haruspex fits the bill nicely. It is the kind of soothsayer who offers divinations and diagnoses from examining the entrails of animals: in rural Ecuador, for example, village haruspices (the plural ending follows the Latin) inspect the insides of dead guinea pigs, the better to cure the patients in their care. — SWConversational, opinionated, and idiomatic, these Word Notes are an opportunity to see a working writer's perspective on a particular word or usage. |
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