W estern Geomancy comes from a divination practice identified in the Arab Antiquity, named "Ilm al Raml" (dots randomly traced on ground or sand), still practiced today in Africa...
Known in the West from the XII th century, when the main part of written geomancies were translated into Medieval Latin from sources in Arab, Hebrew, or Ancient Greek (Byzantine),
it was only into the Late Middle-Ages and Renaissance that translations came in French, Italian, Spanish, German, Europe, and a few in English...

 

 

EDITORIAL

 

 

T he DODECHEDRON PROJECT was born out of three "magic" encounters...

 

• T he first one was a curious XVI th. century French manuscript called "Figures de Géomancie" [*] where one can read that the authors of this "science" (medieval geomancy) affirm that " the power which reigns and governs geomancy is no other than the soul of the person who acts and who traces dots ".

  This book is astonishing in its unusual profusion of external indexes, each of which comprise in a series of coded digits geomantic figure, making it a practical, useful manual (thus, the tag represented as "Conjontio" in the third house is written as : III / 2112. ; which means the figure of Chaptre III composed of 4 stratas of the following dots : even, odd, odd, even. The analogy of this numerical encoding and of its tabs with binary code seemed to me to be very interesting).

[*] Bibliothèque de l'Arsenal, Paris.

• T he second one was the geomantic astrolabe of The British Museum , a major work from Arab metallurgy of the XII th. century and the only known example of an "automatous" geomantic device. It permits the casting of a geomantic theme without any other support other than its mechanical "heart" made of 19 coded wheels (thumbwheels).

On the front of the device an inlaid poem explains, in Arab, the "how to" of the device :

" I am the possessor of eloquence and the silent speaker

and through my speech arise desires and fears.

The judicious one hides his secret thoughts, but I disclose them

just as if hearts were created as my parts...

...But I have spread out the surface of my face out of humility

and have prepared it as a substitute for earth. "

• T he third one was a book named " Le Plaisant jeu du Dodechedron " (XVI th. century) describing a game , using a 12 face dice (dodecahedron, geometric emblem of Macrocosm), 144 versified questions ordered in twelve houses and connected to 1728 oracles inspired by geomancy handbooks.

 

These three singular encounters awaken in me the desire to illustrate history, cultural diffusion and the divinatory principles of geomancy in a vivid fashion, through a multimedia presentation, thanks to a Webpage structured as follows :

 

• A " Museum page " (or small cabinet) will present the manuscript "Geomantic Figures" as well as the geomantic astrolabe of the British Museum.(xii century) of which an animated visual sequence recreates the operation of the tablet (in the form of a case study of a geomantic theme drawn from historical medieval chronicals). It will include the full text of "" Le Plaisant jeu du Dodechedron " (in old french verses)" with a simulation of the dodecahedron's game (only implemented in the French version of this page).

• A " Geomantic Handbook (s) Page" will offer the text of a short geomantic manual in English : " Of Astronomical Geomancy " ( XVI th. century) translated from an original Latin version ascribed to Gerard de Cremone , to be completed from the text of an early English translation of " La Geomance" by Christophe de Cattan (a XVI th century book, printed in London).

  Note : I used the French version of Cattan's handbook for the French version of this page.

• A " Geomantic Shield " will propose an on-line simulation of a Geomantic Theme, using oracular sentences from the "Astronomical Geomancy", and from "La Geomance" of Cattan" completed by the Robert Fludd 's handbook " Fasciculus geomanticus " (from the modern French translation by P.V. Piobb ).

• An " Atlas of The Geomantic World " will introduce the worldwide geomantic diffusion, through commentated bibliographies and links.

 

| ABOUT THE GEOMANCE'S DODECHEDRON PROJECT : |

 

 

Last update 16 December 2003.
Jean-Pierre MOULS multimedia projects are homed now on his own dotcom by GEOMANCE EDITIONS [ URL : http://www.geomance.com ] are :

THIS Dodechedron Project HomePage you actually see is the English version of a page that has formerly initiated the FRENCH DODECHEDRON PROJECT. This project also includes an ANCIENT FRENCH GAME from a XVI th. c. book in Old French verses , " Le Plaisant Jeu du dodechedron ", with questions and oracles inspired by geomancy. From this "Dodechedron Game" name comes the title of the project...

Geomance's Changes Homepage first homed by Multimania.com (now owned by Lycos) : My very first Web project, about Chinese I Ching ( Ji Jing Zhou Yi ) and Eastern Geomancy ( Feng Shu i ), named the GEOMANCE PROJECT. This both French and english webpage was a Member of the Wandering Daoists Webring and a Menber of the Geomance WebRing too.

DODECHEDRON French Version HomePage first homed by Free.fr IS THE FORMER OWNER and EX RingMaster of the GEOMANCE WebRing (The JEAN-PIERRE MOULS, alias geomancedotcom Owner, first version) .

Note : I chose the same name for my WEBRING because the name of "geomance" first refers to western medieval geomancy ...