216 RIGHTHANDEDNESS. 



So also witTi the Hebrews and other ancient nations, as still among 

 ourselves, the seat at the right hand of the host, or of any dignitary, 

 "was the place of honour: as when Solomon -'caused a seat to be set 

 for the king's mother, and she sat on his right hand " (1 Kings, ii. 19)' 

 Again : the term is frequently used in opposition to semal, left hand; 

 as when the children of Israel would pass through Edom ; " We will 

 go by the king's highway; we will not turn to the right hand or to the 

 left" (Numbers, xx. 17). 



But a further use and significance of the terms helps us to the fact 

 that the Hebrew yamin and our right hand are the same. In its 

 secondary meaning it signified the south, as in Ezekiel, xlvii. 1 : *' The 

 fore front of the house stood toward the east, and the waters came down 

 from under, from the right side of the house, at the south side of the 

 altar." The four points are accordingly expressed thus in Hebrew : 

 yamin, ih-Q right, the south ; hedem, the front, the east ; semol, the 

 left, the north; achor, behind, the west. To the old Hebrew, when 

 looking to the east, the west was thus behind, the south on his right 

 hand, and the north on his left. A different idea is illustrated by the 

 like secondary significance of the G-reek ffxaioq, left, or on the left hand ; 

 but also used as west, or westtvard, as in the Iliad, 3, 149, axmai ituXai, 

 the west gate of Troy. The Greek augur, turning as he did his face 

 to the northward, had the left — the sinister, ill-omened, unlucky side, — 

 on the west. Hence the metaphorical significance of dpcarepoq, omin- 

 ous, boding ill. With the Roman augur, the particular quarter of the 

 heavens towards which he was to look appears to have been variable. 

 Livy says the east, Varro the south, and Frontinus the west. Probably 

 part of the augur's professional skill consisted in selecting the aspect of 

 the heavens suited to the occasion. But this done, the flight of birds 

 and other appearances on the right or on the left, determined the will 

 of the gods. "Why," asks Cicero, himself an augur, "Why should 

 the raven on the right, and the crow on the left, make a confirmatory 

 augury ?" " Cur a dextra corvus, a sinistra comix faciat ratum V QDe 

 Divin. I.) The left was the side on which the thunder was declared 

 to be heard which confirmed the inauguration of a magistrate, and in 

 other respects the augur regarded it with special awe. But still the 

 right side was, in all ordinary acceptance, the propitious one ; as in the 

 address to Hercules (^JEn. viii. 302) : 



" Salve vera Jovis proles, pecus addite divis ; 

 Et DOS at tua dexter adi pede sacra secnndo." 



