Meaning

Telling fortunes from the lines on the palms of the hand..

Definitions by Sense

1. Telling fortunes from the lines on the palms of the hand.
2. (countable) A book on palmistry; a system of palmistry.
3. (obsolete, rare) A dexterous use or trick of the hand.

Example Sentences

Chiromantie is a coniecturyng by beholdyng the lynes, or wryncles of the handes called commonly Palmistry.

And those fayre hands within whose louely palmes, Fortune diuineth happie Augurie, Those straightest fingers dealing heauenly almes, Pointed with pur’st of Natures Alcumie, Where loue sits looking in loues palmistrie.

[…] but his [God’s] right hand of truth and bountie, does by a Catholike and vnfeigned Palmistrie, shew the blessings prouided for other men!

He must (at least) hold up his hand, By twelve Free-holders to be scan’d, Who by their skill in Palmistry, Will quickly read his Destiny;

I have seen a gipsy vagabond; she has practised in hackneyed fashion the science of palmistry and told me what such people usually tell.

If you had cared to do so, you could have told the little chap’s fortune from those hands. They were not flat and featureless as you might have expected them to be; already they had all the lines and creases known to palmistry.

1996, Richard Grossinger, New Moon, Berkeley, CA: Frog, Part 7, Chapter 2, p. 534, To fulfill my graduate language requirement I began reading Michel Foucault’s work on signatures, Les Mots et Les Choses, which joined the meanings of the bestiaries, herbals, palmistries, and physiognomies of olden Europe to the totemic orders of plants and animals among the Arapaho, Xhosa, and Aranda.

No living palmistries can spell The bird-runes on the stretched silk of her hand

Word Forms

• palmistries

Synonyms for palmistry

Related Words

When Should You Use Palmistry?

Use palmistry when its meaning, tone and grammar fit the full sentence. A synonym is not always a direct replacement.

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