ONYCIIOMANCY
381
OONSELL
toire di's Drorjues (1094, pt. ii, p. 97). "Mansfield Par- kyiis," writes Mr. Hanbiiry, "in his Life in Abyssinia (i", 410), mentions amons the exports from Massowah a certain article called dufn, which he states is the operculum ol' a shell, and that it is nsed in Nubia as a perfume, being burned with sandal- wood."
Without this authority of the ancient versions, the Syriac etymology of the word, namely, to run in drops, exude, distil, would lead to the idea of a resinous and odoriferous substance of the vegetable kingdom. Ac- cordingly Bochart (/. c.) would refer the word to a kind of resin called bdellium, a transparent aromatic gum found in Arabia; while Jarchi explains it of a smooth root, resembling a nail. Bahr gives the pref- erence to this view {Spiibol. i, 42-2), on the ground that the odor of the burned shells is not pleasant. But this is not a sufficient reason for rejecting the common ex- planation, as its properties might be essentially modified by mixture with other aromatic substances. Whatever is meant by the sea-nail, whether the shells or the oper- culum of any of the marine mollusca, the scale-like cov- ering of their eggs, or any other production or part of an animal, it seems improbable that any such substance could have been one of the constituent spices of the most holy perfume ; not only because we know of none bearing any powerfid and agreeable odor, but specially because all marine creatures that were not filmed and scaled fishes were unclean, and as such could not have been touched by the priests or used in the sanctuarj'. If, therefore, the substance denoted w'ere of such an or- igin, it could only have been used by the Hebrews in ignorance of the fact. For further information on this subject, see Kumph, .4 mboinischeRaritdten-Kummer, cap. xvii, p. 48 (the German ed. Vienna, ITOG) ; and comp. also Sprengel, Comment, ad Diuscor. ii, 10 ; Forskal, Desc. Anim. p. 143 (" Unguis odoratus") ; I'hilos. Trans- actions, xvii, 641 ; Johnston, Inirod. to Conckol. p. 77 ; Gescnius, Thesuur. p. 1388.
Onychomancy, a species of divination anciently practiced by examining the nails of a boj'. For this purpose they were covered with oil and soot and turned to the sini. The image represented by the refiection of the light upon the nails gave the answer required. — Gardner, Faiths of the World, vol. ii, s. v. See Div- ination.
Onyx, the uniform translation in the English ver- sion of the Hebrew word aV/o/«(w, Cn\I3, which occurs in eleven passages of the O. T. The renderings of the old interpreters are various, and often inconsistent with each other. The Sept. in Exod. xxv, 7, xxxv, 9, ren- ders (Tap{?(oe, sardius; in Exod. xxviii, 9, xxxix, 0, cr/xa- paySoQ, smaraffdus ; in Ezek. xxviii, 13, aaT^fiipoQ, sapphire; elsewhere onyx or beryl. This strange in- consistency could spring only from ignorance and con- jecture. Yet the Venetian MS. has always KpoaraWoQ, crystal. The Sept. in Job (xxviii, IG), with .Symmachus (Gen. ii, 12 ; Exod. xxv, 7), Josephus (.1 «/. iii, 7, G), and Jerome, (usually) understand the gem which was called by the (ireeks iSw^, onyx, from its resemblance in color to a human nail. This seems to be favored by compar- ing the similar Arabic root saham, denoting paleness (sec I'lin}-, IJist. Nat. xxxvii, 6, 24; Edrisi, i, 150, ed. Jaubert). The shdhani stone is mentioned ((Jen. ii, 12) as a product of the land of Havilah. Two of these stones, upon which were engraven the names of the children of Israel, six on either stone, adorned the shoul- ders of the high-priest's ephod (Exod. xxviii, 9-12), and were to be worn as " stones of memorial" (see Ka- lisch on Exod. /. c). A shoham was also the second stone in the fourth row of the sacerdotal breastplate (Exod. xxviii, 20). Shoham stones were collected by David for adorning the Temple (1 Chron. xxix, 2). In Job xxviii, 10, it is said that wisdom "cannot be valued with the gold of Ophir, with the precious shoham or the sapphire." The shoham is mentioned as one of the treasures of the king of Tyre (Ezek. xxviii, 13). There
is nothing in the contexts of the several passages where the Hebrew term occurs to help us to determine its signification. Braun {])e Vest. sac. I/cb. p. 727) has en- deavored to show that the sardonyx is the stone indi- cated, and his remarks are well worthy of carefid pe- rusal. Josephus (AiU. iii, 7, 5, and IFrt?', v, 5, 7) ex- pressly states that the shoulder-stones of the high-priest were formed of two large sardonyxes, an onyx being, in his description, the second stone in the fourth row of the breastplate. The sardonyx, however, is but that variety of the onyx in which white and reddish stripes alternate. Bosenmtiller remarks {Bihl. Alterth. iv, 1) : " The onyx is not a transparent stone ; but as the color of the flesh appears through the nail (in Greek called onyx) on the human body, so the reddish mass which is below shines delicately through the whitish surface of the onj'x. There are several varieties of this stone, according to the manner in which thin strata of differ- ent colors alternate in it ; white and reddish stripes al- ternating, form the sardonyx ; wliite and reddish-gray, the chalcedonyx ; grayish-white and yellow-brown, the memphitonyx. The onyx most esteemed by the an- cients had milk-white and brown or white and black strata. When polished, it has a fine lustre ; it is easily wrought into a gem of great beauty. The difi'erent kinds of onyx have, from earh' antiquity, been used for rings, for seals and cameos, and, accordingly, they are frequently found in collections of antiques." Braun traces shoham to the Arabic sachma, "blackness:" "Of such a color," says he, " are the Arabian sardonyxes, which have a black ground-color." This agrees essen- tially with Mr. King's remarks (^Antique Gems, p. 9): " The Arabian species," he says, " were formed of black or blue strata, covered by one of opaque white; over which again was a third of a vermilion color." As to the " onyx" of Eccliis. xxiv, 15, see Onycha.