Xenomancy is an ancient method of divination, which dates back almost to the origins of man. The word comes from the combination of the Greek words xenos and manteia. The first of them means a stranger, a stranger, and a foreigner a second divination. It consists in distinguishing between the past, present and future by observing the first stranger who will stand in our way.
Xenomancy was already practiced by the first shamans and in later years by the Romans and Egyptians. Fortune-telling could take place on people who met during their way, cultural, sports or any other event, social gathering or meeting places which were temples, taverns, squares, baths, etc.
Ancient Greece was famous for many divination techniques, xenomancy was also eagerly practiced there. The rules of interpretation were very simple and so an accidental meeting with a priest was always perceived as a harbinger of something unlucky, an even worse situation was the meeting of a priest riding on a donkey.
For an unspecified reason, men should be afraid of such meetings because they were worse for them than for women.
Accidentally encountering a physically disabled person was associated with great bad luck.
Xenomancy has not always been associated with an evil omen. Meeting a woman with a child or a person considered crazy was a good omen.
Who and where they met was one of the forms of divination reading, the other much more important was reading body movements:
right hand raised – positive sign
left hand raised – negative sign
The pointing hand and gestures played an important role. Interaction with a person just met gave many possible interpretations based on their behavior.
Xenomancy is considered to develop Kedomancy another divination technique based on random events.