Balderdash for the Medieval Gay #20

(a compendium of queer words for the modern fag with a passion for the Middle Ages added hebdomadally on the Sabbath day)

20.) Haruspicy
-noun singular

a.) The art or practices of haruspices (plural of haruspex).*

b.) The ancient Etruscan practice passed on to the Romans of divination through the entrails of sacrificed animals.

[Origin: from the Latin specere, "to look at" and possibly the Sanskrit hir, "an artery." A related word for it is extispicy from Latin exta, "entrails."]

*The haruspex (plural haruspices) was a man trained to practice a form of divination which involved the inspection of the entrails of sacrificed animals, especially the livers of special sheep. Haruspicy probably reached Etruria via the Hittites, perhaps because the Etruscans originated in Asia Minor. The art of haruspicy was taught in the Libri Tagetici, a collection of texts attributed to Tages, a childlike being who figures in Etruscan mythology, and who was discovered in an open field by the hero Tarchon.