Dreams and visions

Since the earliest civilisations sleep has seemed a threshold: at night the gods spoke to kings, the dead returned to visit the living and the strangest images begged to be deciphered. This section traces the long history of dream divination, from the Egypt of the pharaohs to the Naples of the Smorfia. Here you will meet the interpreters' manuals, such as the Chester Beatty papyrus and the Oneirocritica of Artemidorus of Daldis, and the sanctuaries of Asclepius, where the sick slept in the hope of a divine visit. There are the dreams of the Bible, from Joseph to Daniel, the gates of ivory and horn sung by Homer and Virgil, the classifications of Macrobius and the reflections of Synesius of Cyrene. Alongside the philosophers stand the rulers, such as Constantine on the eve of the Milvian Bridge, the dream books of the Middle Ages and the Islamic tradition of ru'ya. Every page presents sources, places and dates, carefully separating documented history from belief and legend.