Dictionary

sortilege en · NOUN

Pronunciation

• (Southern-England) audio
• /ˈsɔːtɪlɪd͡ʒ/

Etymology

From Old French sortilège, from Medieval Latin sortilegium (“witchcraft”), from Latin sortilegus (“sorcerer, diviner”), from sors (“fate”) + legere (“choose”).

Meanings

1. (countable, uncountable) Witchcraft, magic, especially as a means of making decisions or predictions.
   • ‘Too much evil sortilege,’ Glad always says when someone suggests he open a franchise over Cheat Ridge. 2001, JT Leroy, Sarah:
   • We have therefore summoned to our presence a Jewish woman, by name Rebecca, daughter of Isaac of York — a woman infamous for sortileges and for witcheries. 1819, Walter Scott, Ivanhoe:
   • Orthodox believers […] were less happy about using sortilege to coerce God into taking decisions on their behalf. 1971, Keith Thomas, Religion and the Decline of Magic, Folio Society, published 2012, page 115:
   • People who faced difficult decisions or needed insight into the future would consult a diviner, who performed a ritual to locate an oracle in the codex and then interpreted the divinatory text. In Egypt and the wider Mediterranean world, this practice - sortilege - was both common and controversial. 2014, AnneMarie Luijendijk, “Introduction”, in Forbidden Oracles? The Gospel of the Lots of Mary (Studien und Texte zu Antike und Christentum / Studies and Texts in Antiquity and Christianity; 89), Tübingen, Germany: Mohr Siebek, →ISBN, page 1:

Forms

Deriveds

sortileger · sortilegious

Synonyms

whistness · sorcery · dwimmercraft · wandwork · dwimmer · diablerie · spellwork · hexcraft · witchcraft · thaumaturgy · thaumaturgy · wizardry · bewitchery · craft · warlockry · black arts · charmwork · conjuring · druidcraft · hexerei · magic · goety · witchery · conjuration · sorcery · witchwork · wonderworking · witchdom · dark arts · spellcraft · spellcasting · jugglery · mojo · gypsycraft · wizardcraft · dweomercraft · sortilege · wizardry · enchantment

Translations (9)

fi arpomalla ennustaminen (magic) · pl magia (magic) · fi arvanveto (magic) · pt sortilégio (magic) · fi noituus (magic) · pl wróżenie (magic) · pl wróżby (magic) · pl czarnoksięstwo (magic) · fi taikuus (magic)