Also called Bible and key divination, sieve and shears, coscinomancy, turning the riddle
Two old English answer-finding methods in which a key tied into a Bible, or a sieve balanced on shears, turns or falls when a certain name is spoken, used to name a sweetheart or a thief.
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Take care: Never use these methods to accuse a real person of theft or wrongdoing; the historical versions sometimes did harm. Some Christians consider using the Bible for divination disrespectful, so use your own book or ask before borrowing a family Bible.
Bathsheba Everdene and her maid Liddy use an old family Bible and the key of the front door, with the verse from Ruth, on the eve of Valentine's Day to learn whom Bathsheba will marry. Hardy notes a rusty patch on the page from earlier uses, and his preface lists divination by Bible and key among customs fading from the countryside.
Both the sieve and the Bible were used to name a thief. The names of suspects were spoken one by one and the person named when the sieve or book turned was considered guilty. Encyclopedias of the late 18th and 19th centuries reported the sieve-and-shears method still in use in parts of England. Such accusations could harm innocent people, so this version belongs to history.
The Greek poet Theocritus mentions a sieve-diviner, and later writers list sieve divination among ancient methods. A ceremonial magic text printed with Agrippa's works around 1600 gives a formula of nonsense words to make the sieve move.
Coscinomancy, divination with a sieve, goes back to ancient Greece, where the poet Theocritus refers to a woman who read the future with one. The method lasted in Europe through the Middle Ages and was carried to 17th-century New England, where Puritan ministers condemned it as a little witchcraft. Encyclopedias printed between 1797 and 1860 described the sieve hung on shears and turned at the name of a suspect, and said it was still used in parts of England.
The Bible and key used the same principle with a household object everyone owned. It was used for love questions and to find thieves, and it was common enough that Thomas Hardy could rely on readers recognizing it in Far from the Madding Crowd in 1874, while noting in his preface that it was disappearing. Today folklorists explain both methods by tiny unconscious movements of the hands, the same effect seen with pendulums.
Peel an apple in one unbroken strip, throw it over your shoulder, and read the letter it makes on the floor as the initial of a future partner.
Opening a respected book at random and taking the first passage your eye or finger lands on as an answer to your question.
Naming two nuts for a couple and setting them side by side on the fire on Hallowe'en. If they burn quietly together the match is good; if they jump apart, it is not.
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