any utterance made or received as
authoritative, extremely
wise or
infallible (never
wrong).
a priest, in ancient Greece and
Rome, through which gods were consulted for the answers to questions. The temple of one oracle was built over a cavern from which a peculiar, intoxicating vapor was believed to arise. The priestess would inhale the vapor, and her
incoherent ravings were interpreted by a priest who wrote them down in verse. One oracle told the
king of Greece, Croesus (d. 546 b.c.), that if he began a
war he would
destroy a great country. Croesus supposed that this meant he would overthrow the
enemy's
empire, and therefore went to
war against Cyrus, but he instead destroyed his own country with the
war. See also Cyruses in this glossary.