ORDEAL is a divinatory practice that has a judiciary function. The word reached the English language from the medieval ordalium, the latinized form of the German word Urteil ("sentence, judgment"). Two kinds of judiciary ordeals may be distinguished: those prescribed by a judge or judicial body as a form of trial and those that also involve the sentencing and punishment of the accused. Ordeals of the first type are based mostly upon the drawing of lots and the identification of the guilty party among a group of suspects. Except for those that involve the simple drawing of lots, it could be said that every ordeal is designed to prove definitively the guilt or innocence of the accused. For example, a Shoshoni medicine man would take two hairs from the accused and place them in his own tent. If they had disappeared the day after, it was seen as...