Coscinomancy

Coscinomancy is a method of divination that employs a sieve and shears, historically used to identify a guilty party in a criminal matter or to answer questions. The practice is attested in ancient Greece, medieval and early modern Europe, and seventeenth-century New England. The term derives from the Ancient Greek koskinomantis, meaning a diviner who uses a sieve. Theocritus is among the ancient writers who mention it. Cornelius Agrippa described one method, holding that a demon moved the sieve and that a particular conjuration compelled it; he noted that the words of that conjuration were understood neither by the speaker nor by anyone else. A 1567 edition of Agrippa's works includes an illustration of the sieve suspended from shears, though the accompanying Latin text states the sieve turns around, which is physically impossible if held at two diametrically opposite points on the rim.