From time immemorial, people have tried to penetrate the secret meaning of their night visions. Based on the repeated comparison of their plots with subsequent events in real life, a tradition of interpretation was developed, which was the basis of a peculiar literary genre, which includes the compilation of dream books. The magic in them coexists peacefully with the results of scientific observations. Therefore, works of this kind have always been popular with people with different intellectual development.
Interpreters from the banks of the Nile
The oldest dream book that fell into the hands of modern scientists was created in ancient Egypt. It dates from the early 2000s BC. e. The dream book is a very lengthy work containing a detailed presentation of 200 dreams with a description of subsequent events in the life of the people who saw them. In addition, you can find recommendations regarding magical rituals that protect against the machinations of evil spirits.
In the view of the people of that era, falling into a dream, a person opened a door to another world, through which the mostunwanted guests. In this ancient dream book, magic is presented as an integral part of the human worldview, in which the real is closely intertwined with the fruits of his own fantasy.
Founder of a new literary genre
The next of the writings that have come down to us, covering this very vague topic, was a treatise written by the Greek philosopher Artemidorus of Daldian, who lived in the 2nd century. In the five independent books that made up his dream book, magic, although not completely, is already separated from real life.
Thus, the author divides dreams into ordinary ones, caused by natural causes, for example, daytime impressions, and visionary, sent down to man by the gods. It was in them, according to the philosopher, that predictions concerning human destinies were contained. This work, called "Oneirocriticism" (oneiromancy is usually called the prediction of the future from dreams), served as a theoretical basis for many subsequent generations of interpreters. It is recognized as a classic of this literary genre.
Dream books and black magic
In the Middle Ages, the attitude of the church, and, accordingly, of the whole society, to attempts to interpret dreams and predict the future based on them, was extremely ambiguous. The assessments given to this phenomenon by the holy fathers ranged from harsh condemnation, bordering on accusations of witchcraft, to clearly expressed sympathy.
This is explained, first of all, by the fact that, according to the canons of the Christian dogma, one's own will, and thereforethe future destinies of the world the Lord reveals in dreams only to a narrow circle of the elect. The rest of the visions are considered a product of the devil. For this reason, dream books, magic and witchcraft were considered as phenomena of the same order. Many interpreters were accused of having links with evil spirits. They ended their days at the stake of the Inquisition.
Rehabilitated dream interpreters
Throughout the 13th century, under the influence of prominent Western European theologians and philosophers Thomas Aquinas and Albert the Great, the picture changed in many ways. The condemnation of attempts to predict the future on the basis of night visions was closed by a very tolerant attitude towards them on the part of church and secular authorities.
It is noted that it was during this period that, along with the compilation of dream books, the magic of numbers became widespread, a parascience founded by Pythagoras (see the illustration above), who claimed that each of them has its own mystical meaning. In the modern world, this teaching has also found a place for itself, changing only the former name to a more modern one - numerology.
Healing inspired by dreams
Then, in the Middle Ages, it was customary for various healers, based on the dreams seen by the patient, to determine both the diagnosis and the method of treatment. They used the work of the 13th-century Spanish physician and alchemist Arnold de Villanovae (The Soleran Code of He alth) as their theoretical guide.
In it, the author, along with a presentation of a number of natural methods of treatment, outlined in detail the methodsrelief of bodily suffering on the basis of secret instructions contained in night visions. Thus, in his treatise, which has many features of a dream book, magic goes hand in hand with the results of scientific research.
In step with the times
Among the inhabitants of Europe, another surge of interest in the interpretation of night visions was noted in the middle of the 18th century. It was due to the then vogue teachings of astrologers. During this period, magic in dream books began to be replaced by pseudo-scientific, but outwardly very convincing arguments about the influence of one or another phase of the moon on human destinies. Accordingly, among the most important factors that determined the secret meaning of sleep, along with its plot features, was the period when it was seen.
It has long been noted that against the backdrop of wars and all sorts of social upheavals, when the feeling of the ground under your feet is lost, the demand for soothsayers and prophets is increasing significantly. This happened in the era of the Napoleonic Wars, which swept Europe at the beginning of the 19th century. In all countries, including Russia, the book market was conquered by a kind of bestseller called "Daniel's Dream Book", the authorship of which is attributed to the prominent mystic of the 4th century Artemidorus of Daldian. The peculiarity of his work is that it contains for the first time an alphabetical list of the most common dream plots with their comprehensive interpretation.
It is generally accepted that it was this treatise that inspired the famous Martyn Zadeka to create a dream book that won extraordinary popularity in Russia and became, according to A. S. Pushkin, the reference book of his immortal heroine Tatyana Larina. The fashion for divination from dream books, which was established at the beginning of the 19th century, is also associated with this work. Magic and the occult, which had temporarily lost their positions, with his appearance again took possession of the minds of readers. In Russia, there were quite a few imitators of Zadeka, who uninterruptedly supplied the book market with this highly demanded product. In those years, a new round of craze for magic and dream books began.
In a dream and in reality
Despite all the global upheavals that hit humanity in the 20th century, this period of world history became an era of unusually rapid scientific and technological progress that affected all aspects of life. He did not bypass those areas that were previously considered the prerogative of the occultists. Already at the beginning of the century, the works of two authoritative scientists who specialized in the field of psychiatry, the American Gustav Miller and his colleague from Austria, Sigmund Freud, became the property of readers.
Both authors traced the connection between the images that visited a person in a dream and his psychological state. It was the analysis of the human psyche, reflected in night dreams, that allowed them to make predictions regarding the circumstances of later life. The novelty of their position consisted in the assertion that the fate of a person is built by him on the basis of individual characteristics, and dreams perform only an informative function.
