Palmistry

c. 5000 BCE

Although no one knows its exact beginnings, palmistry, or chiromancy, is perhaps the most ancient example of humans’ long history of “reading” the physical body as a way to understand the self and others. The belief in chiromancy arose at a time when there was a more holistic view of life; that is, it was assumed that each person was part of the circle of life, which included the spiritual world, the physical cosmos, and the community of which he or she was a member. Given this worldview, then, it made sense that each person’s body would contain signs of these connections. It is not known when palmistry emerged, although speculative histories place its origins in India or China, but there is historical evidence of its practice in ancient Greece and India. Palmistry almost certainly predates recorded history. On one level, palmistry assumes that the hand is a metaphor for the whole person, and its characteristics reflect the individual’s spiritual, mental, and physical state. Reading the palm on this level makes it possible to know the person’s character and even divine his or her fate. On a higher level, the hand is the universe in a microcosm; the hand thus links the spiritual and physical aspects of the universe and humanity’s role and place within it. The physical character of the hand—spots, lines, creases, colors, and so on—is connected to the planets, the stars, and numbers. Each characteristic has meaning, with different interpretations or readings for right and left hands.

Beyond their significance in chiromancy, the hands became an important psychological tool for memory. Each part of the hand had a distinct mnemonic function, stimulating specific types of memories. Typically, there was an order to the sites so that associations could be formed between the location and the desired memory.

What is historically important about palmistry is that it gave people an opportunity to understand the world and their place in it. The hand and its interpretation served as a gateway to the spiritual world while also indicating the inner character of the person. Although it is not psychological in the strictest sense, it does serve as a forerunner to a psychology of individual differences.

SEE ALSO Physiognomy (1775), Phrenology Comes to America (1832), Somatotypes (1925)

Fortune-Teller by the French painter Charles-André van Loo, eighteenth century.