Dream dictionaries: from Artemidorus to modern dream books

A dream dictionary gives each dream image a fixed meaning: a very old tradition, useful as a guidepost, never as a verdict.

Tradition
List
Guidepost

The essentials

Dream dictionaries at a glance

For you, a dream dictionary serves as a starting point: your own association always corrects the meaning proposed.

Free tool: Interpret my dream
Also read: How to interpret a dream

Interpret my dream

Artemidorus and the Oneirocritica

In the 2nd century, Artemidorus of Daldis gathered in the Oneirocritica five books of dreams and interpretations: it is the oldest Greek treatise of its kind to have come down to us. He traveled, asked questions, compared, and took into account the occupation, age, and situation of each dreamer. His book fed most of the dream dictionaries that followed for centuries.

Ibn Sirin and the Muslim tradition

In the Muslim tradition, dream interpretation is attached to Ibn Sirin, a scholar of Basra who lived from 653 to 728. The dream book attributed to him was probably composed later, and its authenticity is debated. The collections that bear his name often mix several authors; the dictionary pages cite them as a named tradition.

From the Dreams of Daniel to modern dictionaries

From the 5th to the 16th century the Dreams of Daniel circulated in Europe: an alphabetical list of images, each followed by a good or bad meaning, inspired by Artemidorus and dedicated to the prophet without being by him. Printed dream books and today’s dream dictionaries descend from it. In 1900, Freud broke from it by starting the meaning from each person’s associations, a break that Versana’s pages follow.

Facts and sources

Artemidorus of Daldis (2nd century) left the Oneirocritica, five books, the oldest surviving Greek treatise on dream interpretation. Artemidorus, Oneirocritica; Wikipedia (en), “Oneirocritica”
In the Muslim tradition, dream interpretation is linked to Ibn Sirin (653–728), to whom a dream book of disputed authenticity is attributed. Wikipedia (en), “Ibn Sirin” (disputed attribution)
From the 5th to the 16th century, the Dreams of Daniel (Somniale Danielis) circulated: an alphabetical list of images, each followed by a good or bad meaning, inspired by Artemidorus and dedicated to the prophet without being by him. Wikipedia (en), “Somniale Danielis”
Freud contrasts his method with the “dream dictionary,” which translates each image by a fixed meaning. S. Freud, The Interpretation of Dreams, 1900, ch. II

A dream is read as a mirror of what you are living, never as an omen: no reading here predicts anything at all.

Dream dictionaries: your questions

Are dream dictionaries reliable?

They reflect the beliefs of an era and a culture, not a rule valid for everyone. Two different dictionaries often give opposite meanings for the same image. Use them as leads to compare with your emotion and your life of the moment.

Why do dream dictionaries contradict each other?

They draw on different sources, copy older lists, and adapt them. Versana’s pages name each reading (Freud, Jung, research, traditions) instead of melting several into a single answer, so that the origin of each lead stays visible.