The Dream Book of the Byzantine Emperors I: Body, Love and Death

About this book

What does it mean to dream of your hair, your teeth, your hands or your own burial? The Byzantines had an answer for each, and this book gives it chapter by chapter. It is the first of three books that together translate, in full, the Dream Book of Achmet, son of Sereim, composed around the tenth century for the imperial court and printed in Greek in Paris in 1603.

Here the dream is never the same for everyone. It is read one way for a king, another for a rich man, a poor man, a woman, and the season, the phase of the Moon and the hour of the night matter too. Long, thick hair means wealth; blood and wounds are read as gold; the teeth are the family, the front two for children and parents, the eye-teeth for the pillar of the house. Whoever sees himself buried will be as rich as the earth that covered him was deep. Three “teachings”, Indian, Persian and Egyptian, are set side by side, each with its own interpreter, and sometimes they agree and sometimes they say the opposite.

Book I covers chapters 1 to 137: the divine and holy, judges and power, then the body from head to foot, love, blood and death. There are short stories as well: the question about the hair of the legs put to Achmet at the court of Mamun, and the dream of the chief counsellor in Mecca, in which the four corners of the temple stand for four children, two of whom will inherit the throne.

Translated into modern English by BlusaBooks, directly from the Greek text of the Paris edition of 1603 (N. Rigault; Duke University copy, archive.org); the Latin translation printed beside it served as an aid, and the text is in the public domain. The translation is complete, without abridgement, and the beliefs of the period are kept as written; our explanations stand only in the notes at the foot of the page. No images of the printed edition are reproduced.

What is inside

• 137 chapters, complete: faith, judges and power, hair, perfumes, eyes, teeth, hands, belly, blood, burial.
• The same dream read three ways: Indian, Persian and Egyptian teachings.
• A foreword on the book, its interpreters and how to read it.
• Notes on strange words, places and customs, at the foot of the page.
• A commentary in plain words: what the dreams promised, by wish (wealth, children, love, power).
• PDF, A5 page size (148 × 210 mm), 100 pages, readable on phone, tablet and computer.

Who it is for

Readers of dream dictionaries and old dream books, of Byzantine and medieval history, of occult and esoteric texts, and anyone who wants to know what people of the Byzantine court believed their dreams foretold.

A historical source: the book gives a Byzantine text and what historians know about it. It shares old knowledge and promises no results. What it says about illness is a medieval belief, not medical advice, and the dream meanings are those of the Byzantine court. Digital PDF, delivered for download after payment.