Dictionary

speal-bone en · NOUN

Etymology

A variant of spule (“shoulder”) + bane (“bone”).

Meanings

1. (Scotland, obsolete) The shoulder blade.
   • In heteroscopic divination the process is rather one of inference from external facts. The methods are very various. […] In haruspication, or the inspection of entrails, in scapulomancy or divination by the speal-bone or shoulder-blade, in divination by footprints in ashes, found in Australia, Peru and Scotland, the voluntary element is prominent, for the diviner must take active steps to secure the conditions necessary to divination. 1911, “Divination”, in Encyclopædia Britannica, 11th edition, volume 8, New York, N.Y.: Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., page 333:

Forms