Water-Based Divination in Greco-Roman Egypt: New Insights from the Greek Magical Papyri

In Greco-Roman Egypt diviners used a wide variety of materials to facilitate communication between themselves and the otherworldly beings they sought knowledge from. One of the most readily accessible, and thus prevalent, materials used for this purpose was water. Through comparative examination of primary texts, this article provides new insights into the roles and functions attributed to water in the context of divination and explores how the diviners’ perceptions of this everyday material served to underpin their methodological and material choices. Further linking the contexts of divination and magic, these perceptions of water demonstrated a practical application of key tenants in magical thinking combined with the existing religious understandings of their world. As scholarly interest in materiality continues to increase in the study of antiquity, this new exploration of water aims to encourage further study of divination’s varied materiality as a new avenue through which to explore this well-examined practice.