Paper Ouija Oracle

Paper Ouija Oracle

Ask the spirits a question via this curious paper ouija oracle...

The paper Ouija Oracle has many names: In Britain and America it is commonly known as a fortune teller, snap dragon, or cootie catcher. In Catalonia it is called a Quatre Sabaters, in Denmark, a Rap-Rapper and in Italy an Inferno-Paradiso. Despite its universal appeal, this playful piece of origami has a somewhat arcane history.

This edition is believed to have been first circulates in the late 1860s as a portable version of the popular but cumbersome planchette and likely evolved in tandem with the modern ouija or talking board. It is an exact facsimile of the original, which was recently discovered bookmarking a page of a grimoire belonging to the renowned spiritualist medium, M. Trompeur.

The exact timeline for when this innocuous paper artifact became a fortune teller is somewhat shrouded in mystery. There is some anecdotal evidence to suggest that its first esoteric application dates to 17th Century Europe, possibly as a divination tool that was masked as a salt cellar.