Perchance To Dream: Oneiromancy Ancient History Of Dream Interpretation
Perchance To Dream: Oneiromancy Ancient History Of Dream Interpretation By MartiniF History & Tradition 1 Dreams and their ancient interpretations are documented in contemporary written sources such as official inscriptions, literature, even special dream books, called oneirocritics, from Mesopotamia and Egypt's early civilizations. They demonstrate that dreams played an important role in government, religion and daily life. Despite the fact that early civilizations had a variety of ideas about what dreams were, they always seemed to place a high value on them. Dreams were regarded as an especially important gateway of receiving messages from the world of power and spirit, from the gods and other powerful beings. Dream interpretation was the responsibility of those with experience in such things in these groups such as tribal elders, matriarchs and patriarchs of the family or community, priests and shamans. Shamans were especially valued for their advice bec...