Crossword clues for necromancy
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Necromancy \Nec"ro*man`cy\, n. [OE. nigromaunce, nigromancie, OF. nigromance, F. n['e]cromance, n['e]cromancie, from L. necromantia, Gr. ?; nekro`s a dead body (akin to L. necare to kill, Skr. na[,c] to perish, vanish) + ? divination, fr. ? diviner, seer, akin to E. mania. See Mania, and cf. Internecine, Noxious. The old spelling is due to confusion with L. niger black. Hence the name black art.] The art of revealing future events by means of a pretended communication with the dead; the black art; hence, magic in general; conjuration; enchantment. See Black art.
This palace standeth in the air,
By necromancy plac[`e]d there.
--Drayton.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
c.1300, nygromauncy, "divination by communication with the dead," from Old French nigromancie "magic, necromancy, witchcraft, sorcery," from Medieval Latin nigromantia (13c.), from Latin necromantia "divination from an exhumed corpse," from Greek nekromanteia, from nekros "dead body" (see necro-) + manteia "divination, oracle," from manteuesthai "to prophesy," from mantis "prophet" (see mania). Spelling influenced in Medieval Latin by niger "black," on notion of "black arts." Modern spelling is a mid-16c. correction. Related: Necromantic.
Wiktionary
n. 1 divination involving the dead or death. 2 Loosely, any sorcery or witchcraft, especially involving death or the dead, particularly sorcery involving raise or reanimate the dead.
WordNet
n. the belief in magical spells that harness occult forces or evil spirits to produce unnatural effects in the world [syn: sorcery, black magic, black art]
conjuring up the dead, especially for prophesying
Wikipedia
Necromancy or nigromancy is a supposed practice of magic involving communication with the deceased – either by summoning their spirit as an apparition or raising them bodily – for the purpose of divination, imparting the means to foretell future events or discover hidden knowledge, to bring someone back from the dead, or to use the deceased as a weapon, as the term may sometimes be used in a more general sense to refer to black magic or witchcraft.
The word "necromancy" is adapted from Late Latin necromantia, itself borrowed from post-Classical Greek νεκρομαντεία (nekromanteía), a compound of Ancient Greek νεκρός (nekrós), "dead body", and μαντεία (manteía), " divination by means of"; this compound form was first used by Origen of Alexandria in the 3rd century BC. The Classical Greek term was ἡ νέκυια ( nekyia), from the episode of the Odyssey in which Odysseus visits the realm of the dead and νεκρομαντεία in Hellenistic Greek, rendered as necromantīa in Latin, and as necromancy in 17th-century English.
Necromancy (also known as The Witching) is a 1972 horror film directed by Bert I. Gordon and starring Orson Welles and Pamela Franklin.
Usage examples of "necromancy".
And behind it all I saw the ineffable malignity of primordial necromancy, black and amorphous, and fumbling greedily after me in the darkness to choke out the spirit that had dared to mock it by emulation.
Having obtained his doctorial hat, he travelled through Europe practising necromancy and acquiring a thoroughly bad reputation.
I now called to mind what I had read of certain colleges in old times, where judicial astrology, geomancy, necromancy, and other forbidden and magical sciences were taught.
The Free Magic that remained separate from the Charter is the Free Magic of necromancy, of Stilken, Margrue, and Hish, of Analem and Gorger, and all the other fell creatures, constructs, and familiars.
How often had Nourice warned Meg against necromancy, the forbidden practice of summoning the dead.
If he had ministered, in some wise, to Daniel following his lithotomy, he had not done so by necromancy.
Into the river which led a roaring course towards the hell-spawned Forest of Troos which lay within the borders of Org, country of necromancy and rotting, ancient evil.
So swift was that transition from the grisly unreal to the normal that even to my unsuperstitious mind it smacked of necromancy.
Method from the essential Saltes of humane Dust, a Philosopher may, without any criminal Necromancy, call up the Shape of any dead Ancestour from the Dust whereinto his Bodie has been incinerated.
Yet still do these shine as veritable Magi in comparison to the feckless rattlepates who adorn the pantheon of Sfinctrian necromancy.
There was an old tradition that the students of necromancy or the black art, on reaching a certain pitch of proficiency, were obliged to run through a subterranean hall, where the devil literally caught the hindmost unless he sped so swiftly that the arch enemy could only seize his shadow, and in that case, a veritable Peter Schlemihl, he never cast a shadow afterwards!
Even a spirit such as yours, swordsman, with the strength to struggle as you are doing against the geas of the necromancy, might fail if faced, unprepared, by such knowledge.
My spies reported that, with Agiochristoforites, there was a very active monk whom Andronicus had wanted with him, after the death of Manuel, for he was an expert in necromancy.
Whether Isaac, as Zosimos's necromancy asserted, had long been preparing his coup, or whether he happily exploited a misstep by his enemies, it was clear that the throne of Andronicus was now tottering.
And there are three kinds of this superstition: - Necromancy, Astrology, or rather Astromancy, the superstitious observation of stars, and Oneiromancy.