The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition. Columbia Encyclopedia World Factbook Columbia Gazetteer American Heritage Coll. It is known that divination by means of crack patterns in shells was practiced in China as early as the 2d cent. In the West, before divination spread throughout the Greco- Roman world, various branches of the practice as used by the Chaldaeans were considered superior to all the sciences. The Greeks placed their greatest trust in the wisdom of the oracle .
Divination persists to the present day in crystal gazing, palmistry, fortune-telling, and astrology.
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