palmistry

/ˈpɑːmɪstɹi/

Etymology

From Middle English palmestrie. Equivalent to palm + -ist + -ry.

palmistry means telling fortunes from the lines on the palms of the hand. Lexicurio rates it Rare gem — a strength score of 84 out of 100.

Why this word is great

PALMISTRY — [Noun] The art or practice of interpreting character or foretelling the future by examining the lines and features of the palm. From Middle English palmestrie, equivalent to palm (from Old English, from Latin palma, meaning "palm of the hand") + -ist (denoting a practitioner) + -ry (denoting a practice or art). Unlike "chiromancy," which cloaks itself in oracular gravity, or "physiognomy," which reads the fixed map of the face, palmistry is an intimate, tactile cartography of the self. It is the warm press of a fortune-teller's thumb tracing the lifeline's arc, the silent scrutiny of your own crossed fate and heart lines, and the faint topography of creases that deepen with each year's labor—a profound consolation that our story is not random but is, quite literally, in our own hands.

noun

Telling fortunes from the lines on the palms of the hand.“Chiromantie is a coniecturyng by beholdyng the lynes, or wryncles of the handes called commonly Palmistry.”
A book on palmistry; a system of palmistry.“No living palmistries can spell The bird-runes on the stretched silk of her hand”
A dexterous use or trick of the hand.“1711, Joseph Addison and Richard Steele, The Spectator, Volume 2, No. 130, 30 July, 1711, London: J. and R. Tonson, 12th edition, 1739, p. 182, In the Height of his Good-humour, meeting a common Beggar upon the Road who was no Conjuror, as he went to relieve him he found his Pocket was pick’d: That being a Kind of Palmistry at which this Race of Vermin are very dextrous.”