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Dreams listed by date:
pre-1900

This page begins the World Dream Bank's chronological index. Here are dreams from ancient times through the 1800s. Dates on this page are less exact than later ones; I'm culling dream accounts from books, so narratives are often secondhand, not every detail is clear--and I can't email dead dreamers for clarification!

NEXT: 1900-1909
RELATED TOPICS: oracular dreams - predictive dreams - dreams of past or future
to 1899, 1900s, 1910s, 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s, 1970, 71, 72, 73, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79, 1980, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86, 87, 88, 89, 1990, 91, 92, 93, 94, 95, 96, 97, 98, 99, 2000, 01, 02, 03, 04, 05, 06, 07, 08, 09, 2010, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 2020, 21, 22, 23, 24

See also the full INDEX OF SUBJECTS.

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ENKIDU: by Gilgamesh of Uruk, c. 2750 BCE, an early prophetic dream
The hero Gilgamesh troubles his city till he dreams the gods will send him a best friend & lover, Enkidu...
CAUTION: SEX
INANNA'S RIVER OF BLOOD: by King Sargon I; c. 2335 BCE, a call-to-greatness nightmare
Sargon, a delivery man, dreams the Goddess drowns the King in a river of blood. He wakes and tells the King...
JACOB'S LADDER: by Jacob, grandson of Abraham; c. 2050 BCE; a self-fulfilling prophetic dream.
Jacob dreams of angels climbing to heaven. He meets God, who promises
the Holy Land to him and his tribe. Jacob uncritically accepts...
THE SPHINX WANTS CLEANING: by Thutmoses IV, c.1400 or 1405 BCE; a god's dream-bargain
Thutmoses napped in the shade under the Great Sphinx--then buried to the neck in sand.
The resident sun-god complained of the sand; "the throne is yours if you'll clear it off..."
TORCH-BEARER: by Queen Hecuba of Troy; c. 1270 BCE, an alarming dream.
Hecuba dreams she gives birth, not to a child but a flaming torch! But she lets Paris live...
CAUTION: MORAL NO-WIN SITUATION
EAGLE AND GEESE: by Penelope of Ithaka; c.1240 BCE, a subliminal, self-interpreting dream
I dreamt an eagle slaughtered my twenty geese. I wept until he spoke to me: "Take heart! I am thy husband..."
SOLOMON'S CHOICE: by King Solomon, c. 970 BCE; a god's dream-bargain
As his reign begins, King Solomon worries he's inadequate. He dreams
God offers him one gift, of his choice--but what would help the most?
THEFT OF THE ARK: by King Solomon, c. 960 BCE; a dream acted on too late
Ethiopian records say Solomon and Makeda, the Queen of Sheba, had a son who stole
the Ark of the Covenant! Solomon dreamt of the theft but didn't check til it was too late...
NEBUCHADNEZZAR'S TREE: by King Nebuchadnezzar II; c. 583 BCE, a predictive dream
Nebuchadnezzar dreams a voice from heaven commands a great tree be cut;
Daniel interprets this as a prediction the king will go mad for 7 years...
ELEPHANT WITH A LOTUS: by Queen Maya, 564 BCE? a prophetic Buddhist dream
After 20 years without a child, Maya dreams devas carry her to a holy lake, wash her...
and then an elephant carrying a lotus flower enters her right side. She knows it means...
CAUTION: DREAM OMITS TINY DETAIL--IMMINENT DEATH
PROPHETIC DREAM OF BUDDHA'S FATHER: by King Suddhodana, c.563 BCE? an uneasy dream
Suddhodana dreams of great upheavals; no courtier can interpret the dream.
An ascetic claims the upheaval will be for the good, then... turns into an owl?!
CAUTION: PERHAPS NOT ENTIRELY ACCURATE
THE DEATH OF ATYS: by King Croesus c.560 BCE; predictive dream, or self-fulfilling?
Croesus dreamt his heir Atys was slain by an iron blade; he locked them all in the armory. But Atys went
hunting; his guard Adrastus's spear went astray. Did Fate kill Atys, or superstition rattling poor Adrastus?
BUDDHA'S FIVE DREAMS: by Siddartha, soon to be called the Buddha, c.540 BCE?
I'm gigantic, stretching from Ceylon to Tibet. Grass grows from my navel to heaven.
Worms crawl on me. Birds flock to me and change color. I climb a mountain of dung...
CAUTION: PIOUS MISINTERPRETATIONS
INVADE GREECE, OR ELSE!: by Xerxes I and his uncle Artabanus; 480 BCE, three linked, deceitful dreams.
Xerxes twice dreams a god orders him to attack Greece. So he asks his uncle to dream of the god to confirm...
GOBLET OF GOLD: by Sophocles, between 450-406 BCE; a detective dream.
A huge gold cup was stolen from the Temple of Hercules. Sophocles thrice dreamt Hercules named the thief...
SOCRATES'S SWAN: by Socrates, 407 BCE; an early prophetic dream.
The night before he met his greatest student, Plato, Socrates dreamed he nursed a baby swan who grew...
THREE-YEAR PREGNANCY: by Ithmonike of Pellene, c.320 BCE, Two dreams of an odd god.
I was barren. I asked Asklepios, God of Healing, to make me pregnant. Soon I was--for 3 years, until...
BUTTERFLY: by Zhuang-zi; c.300 BCE, a dream questioning identity.
I dreamed I was a butterfly, fluttering about, content with my lot. Suddenly I awoke and was Chuang-tzu again...
THE MEGARA INN: by an Arcadian Greek c.200 BCE; two dreams that don't prevent a murder but do solve it
A traveler dreams his friend's attacked, but he ignores it. Next he dreams his friend begs him to at least avenge him...
GOLDEN CHAIN: by Cicero, 46/1/1 or 45/1/1 BCE, a prescient dream by an anti-interpretationist
Dream-skeptic Cicero dreamed a youth descended from heaven on a golden chain.
The next day he first met Octavius, and exclaimed "but there is the actual boy I dreamed of!"
The boy became Augustus Caesar, presiding over Rome's golden age...
CALPURNIA'S DREAM: by Calpurnia and her husband Julius Caesar; 44(BCE)/3/14, two warning dreams.
The night before Caesar's assassination, he dreamed he flew above the clouds and met Jupiter;
his wife Calpurnia dreamed he'd be stabbed, and begged him not to go out, but politics...
THE BATTLE OF PHILIPPI: by Augustus Caesar's friend; 42 BCE, a lifesaving dream
Augustus was ill, but a friend's dream prompted him to leave his tent before Brutus's assassins...
ENTER, NERO!: by Emperor Nero; c. 58 CE, a series of guilty surreal nightmares.
After murdering his mother, Nero dreams he's losing control: ships drift, statues chase him, and his own tomb says...
NERO'S TOOTH: by Vespasian, c.65 CE, an oracular dream fulfilled alarmingly soon
Vespasian dreamed he and his family would rise only when Emperor Nero lost his teeth.
The next day, a surgeon happened to show Vespasian a tooth he'd just extracted from...
JOSEPHUS, LET GO: by Josephus Flavius; c.65 CE, vague predictive dreams
Resistance fighter Josephus, cornered, took a hard look at his prophetic dreams and decided to make peace...
NOCTURNAL HAIRCUTS: by two of Pliny the Younger's servants; 96 CE. Subliminal? Oracular? Prank?
Two boys dream robed figures climb in the window to cut their hair--and find, awake, someone has. While Pliny...
SCULPTOR OR WRITER?: by Lucian of Samosata, c.135 CE, a career-advice dream
As a boy, my family urged me to aim low and follow our trade: stonecarving. I dreamt two strong women fought
over me, a grubby sculptor and an elegant writer. I sided with the writer, and she let me ride in her flying chariot...
XANTHUS: by a client of Artemidorus, c.150 CE, a prodromal dreamlet
A man dreamed he was the River Xanthus at Troy. I interpreted it to mean he'd bleed for years, but not die of it...
NATALIUS' WELTS: by Natalius the Confessor, c.155 CE (or 199?), a dream leaving physical traces.
Natalius dreamed that angels whipped him for joining a heretic cult, and woke to find welts on his back...
PERPETUA'S LAST DREAM: by St Perpetua; 203 CE, a flying, sex-changing, defiant dream.
Facing death the next day in a Roman arena, Perpetua dreams of the spiritual duel behind the physical one...
GENNADIUS: by Gennadius, ca. 415 CE, apparently the first recorded lucid dream
Gennadius re-dreams a previous dream, helping him see he's dreaming. His guide points out spiritual implications...
GUNTRAM'S SNAKE by King Guntram, c.560 or '70 CE; a profitable out-of-body dream
On a hunt, Guntram took a nap. His courtier saw a snake emerge from his mouth; it tried to cross a creek. The
courtier lay his sword out like a bridge, and the snake crossed, climbed a hill, and went in a hole. It returned
and crawled in Guntram's mouth. He woke and said "I was crossing a river on a great iron bridge..."
RAGNHILD'S TREE and HALFDAN'S CURLS: by Queen Ragnhild and King Halfdan of Norway; c.850 CE
twin dreams predicting their children and nation will prosper.
Ragnhild sees a lovely tree rooted in her pain and blood;
Halfdan sleeps with pigs and dreams he has a great head of hair...
CAUTION: KIDNAPPING, ARSON, GENERAL BARBARISM (check the date!)
ARHATS IN A DREAM: by Guan Xiu, c.891, early dream paintings
Guan Xiu, a painter in the late Tang Dynasty, dreamt that sixteen arhats
or luohans (Buddhist sort-of-saints)asked him to paint their portraits--
not their earthly forms but their (rather peculiar) astral forms. He did...
THE GIANTESS OF THVERA: by Viga-Glum Eijolfsson; early 940s?, a very public clairvoyant dream.
Viga-Glum dreamt a giantess came to visit. "She is the spirit-guide of my grandfather in Norway. He is dead...
GISLI THE OUTLAW: by Gisli the Outlaw of Iceland; 966-973, a series of at least ten life-saving dreams.
Gisli had two spirit-wives who told him in dreams how to evade the bounty-hunters after him... for 13 years!
EAGLES IN LOVE WITH A SWAN: by Thorstein Egilson; c. 982 AD, a twenty-year predictive dream
Before his daughter's even born, Thorstein dreams two eagles in love with a swan kill one another in rivalry over her...
CAUTION: PATRIARCHAL BARBARIANS
GUDRUN'S FOUR HUSBANDS: by Gudrun Osvifursdottir; summer 988, plus spring 1026
Four childhood dreams predicting Gudrun's life; plus a predictive dream by her husband Thorkell Eyjolfson
Gudrun dreams of four treasures: a hood, a bracelet, a ring, a jeweled helm. Her cousin sees them as four marriages...
1000s
WOLVES IN THE BOOTH: by Thordhr "the Terror"; c.1000, a warning dream
Thordhr dreams a pack of wolves attack him in a trade-booth! He wakes sure the trade-fair will be trouble...
CAUTION: ICELANDIC NAMES AND CUSTOMS
BRUSHWOOD BELLY: by An the Black; Easter 1003, a bizarre predictive dream.
An dreams a scary woman pulls his guts out and fills him up with brush! He wakes, gets gutted in a feud, and then...
CAUTION: BLOODY VIKINGS!
THORHADD'S FOURTEEN DREAMS: by Thorhadd of Berufjord, c.1018; 14 warning dreams (2 predictive)
Thorhadd's been slandering his enemy Thorstein. He spars publicly with a dream expert
who interprets all his dreams as: "Your tongue just can't quit!" True. It can't...
CAUTION: VIKING EGOS (AND BODY COUNT)
REBORN AS A CAT: by Lady Sarashina's sister, April or May 1022, a dream of a friend's past life
Sarashina adopts a stray cat with oddly refined manners. Her sister dreams the cat tells of her
last life, as the daughter of a high official. The cat does seem to understand human speech...
GUDRUN'S FOUR HUSBANDS: by Gudrun Osvifursdottir; summer 988, plus spring 1026
Four childhood dreams predicting Gudrun's life; plus a predictive dream by her husband Thorkell Eyjolfson
Gudrun dreams of four treasures: a hood, a bracelet, a ring, a jeweled helm. Her cousin sees them as four marriages...
AMATERASU'S MIRROR: by Lady Sarashina and an unnamed priest, c. 1035/3/22, two dreams of a life-choice
Sarashina dreams (again) she needs to leave court life and a spiritual path. Her skeptical mom sends a
priest to the temple to dream for her! But he too dreams the Goddess shows two life-choices--happy or sad...
DON'T TREAD ON ME: by Herdis Bollisurdottir; c.1040, a psychic dream of a ghost with an agenda
A ghost complains Herdis's grandma bothers her. Herdis wakes, tells Grandma, and they dig up the floor to find...
AMIDA: by Lady Sarashina, 1055/10/13, a dream of a salvation-offer
Three years before her husband died and she was left alone, Sarashina dreamt
Amida Buddha stood in her garden and told her "Later I shall return to fetch you"...
1100s
ARROW OF FIRE: by Archbishop Anselm, King William Rufus & a monk, 1100/8/1, 3 predictive dreams
Anselm dreams God orders King William's death by an arrow of fire; the
King dreams his blood covers the sun. Waking, he mocks a third man's ominous
dream, goes hunting, and dies bloodily at sunset, an arrow in his heart...
GUNNHILDR’S BIRTH DREAM: by Gunnhildr; c. 1150, a surreal predictive dream.
I dreamt I gave birth to a white-hot stone shedding sparks. Most folk would find my son strange...
COLLAR OF GOLD: a Welshman of Kemmeis District; 1170s? A recurring dream of treasure
A rich man dreamt thrice that hidden in St Berner's Well near his house was a golden collar. He reached in and...
CAUTION: OW
PEACOCK KINGS: by Myoe Shonin; 1196/8 or 1196/9, an ecstatic dream
I meet two Peacock Kings bigger than human beings, who chant blessings until I wake with tears drenching my pillow...
1200s
DRINK THE DOVE: by Myoe Shonin; c.1202/9/11, a pre-Surrealist surreal dream
The sparrow died in the ashes, but the dove in my hands became a blue cloud.
I drank it, thinking "This will benefit us all"...
SHEEP IN THE SKY: by Myoe Shonin; c.1220/9/20, a dream of strange advice.
A strange transforming thing appeared in the sky--a light, a sheep, a man. It told me to stop burning my head...
ZEMMYO: by Myoe Shonin; c.1221/4/20, a spiritual Pygmalion dream.
A doll sent from China breaks into tears over her exile here in Japan. I reassure her and she becomes real...
THE BOULDER DISSOLVES: by Myoe Shonin; mid Dec. 1230, an old monk's dream of liberation
I was trapped inside a boulder, but as I chanted it melted around me until it resembled a discarded skin...
OSMAN'S DREAM: by Osman I, founder of the Ottoman Empire, 1280?, a predictive dream
The moon rises from my friend's body, and sinks into mine. Then
a great tree grows from my body, covering much of the world...
CAUTION: ORAL TRADITION AT BEST
1300s
PRODROMAL DREAMLETS: by Arnaud de Villeneuve, c.1300; Conrad Gessner, 1565/12/8;
M. Teste, 1830-1848, and Maurice Macario, early 1850s? four dreams predicting illness
Dog bites doctor's leg. Snake bites scholar's chest. Apoplexy kills a
government minister. Tonsillitis flattens a sleep and dream researcher...
THE FLYING HART: by King Charles VI; c.1390, a flying dream.
King Charles loses a new hawk. But a winged deer lands, bows to him,
and offers him a wild ride across France after his bird...
1400s
THE SWAFFHAM TINKER: by John Chapman and a London shopkeeper; c.1454, two interlocked dreams
Chapman dreams he must walk 100 miles to London Bridge; on the bridge, a stranger says
"dreams are nonsense! Why, I dreamt of buried treasure 100 miles away, in some town called..."
LEONARDO'S BIRD: by Leonardo da Vinci, c.1455, a bizarre childhood dream or vision--or real memory?
The black bird hovered above my cradle, and several times struck me with its tailfeathers between my opened lips...
1500s
THE PEN: by Elector Frederick of Saxony; 1517/10/30, a predictive political dream.
Frederick dreams a monk writes words on the door of Wittenburg’s church
with a pen so big it pokes the Pope. The next day...
CARDANO'S DREAMS: by Girolamo Cardano, 1521 & 1547/8/15, two confusing oracular dreams
1521: I ask a talking ape how long I'll live. "Four years" he says. "No longer?" "No."
26 years later, I'm still hoping to get truth from dream-figures--two dead guys tell me...
CAUTION: JUNGIANS BEHAVING BADLY
STORM OF HUGE RAINDROPS: by Albrecht Dürer; 1525/5/30, watercolor of a size-nightmare
The first drop struck about four miles away, with terrific force and thunder, breaking and drowning the land...
CARDANO'S DREAMS: by Girolamo Cardano, 1521 & 1547/8/15, two confusing oracular dreams
1521: I ask a talking ape how long I'll live. "Four years" he says. "No longer?" "No."
26 years later, I'm still hoping to get truth from dream-figures--two dead guys tell me...
CAUTION: JUNGIANS BEHAVING BADLY
HIDE THE LIST!: by Anonymous; c. 1550, a recurrent warning dream.
A London Protestant dreamed Bloody Mary would find the congregation's member-list and burn them all...
HYPNOGOGIC ASSAULT: by Dr Simon Forman; 1559-63, recurring hypnogogic images.
From age six on, Simon nightly climbs mountains and faces roaring floods in a sort of naptime bootcamp...
JACK OF GREATNESS: by Mistress Abbot of Guilford; 1562; a predictive, pregnancy-craving dream.
Mistress Abbot dreams if she eats a jackfish her child will be great. Next morning one swims into her waterbucket...
PRODROMAL DREAMLETS: by Arnaud de Villeneuve, c.1300; Conrad Gessner, 1565/12/8;
M. Teste, 1830-1848, and Maurice Macario, early 1850s? four dreams predicting illness
Dog bites doctor's leg. Snake bites scholar's chest. Apoplexy kills a
government minister. Tonsillitis flattens a sleep and dream researcher...
HE LOOKED SOURLY: by John Dee; 1582/11/24, a mage's dream of dying, and after.
The foremost wizard of Shakespeare's age dreams he's dead. They're burning his books, but that doesn't bother him...
1600s
MISCARRIAGE: by John Donne; 1612, a clairvoyant hallucination.
Donne, in Paris, was alarmed by a vision of his wife holding a dead baby. At that hour, in England, his wife...
QUOD VITAE: by Rene Descartes; 1619/11/11, three mystical dreams.
In one night Descartes had three dreams convincing him he had to change the course of his life...
MR. WILLOW AND THE LOCUSTS: by a Yi Valley magistrate, Dec. 1641?, as told by Pu Songling; a shamanic dream
As locusts advanced on his farm district, a magistrate dreamt a Mr. Willow had advice.
He took it. Bearing a gift of rice wine, he sought out the Goddess of the Locusts, and...
THE VISION: by Robert Herrick; 1648, an eroti-political dream poem
I dreamt Anacreon the poet reeled with drink and lust--and I am wild and wanton like to him...
THE ADMIRAL'S DEATH: by Mary Deane; 1653/6/2, a clairvoyant warning dream.
The wife of Admiral Richard Deane dreamt how he died two days before the news arrived...
SNOT-BIRD FORGERY!: a dream by Samuel Pepys, 1667/6/29, & a nightmare by Thomas Macaulay, c.1857
Samuel Pepys dreamt of kidneystones, pee, come, & snot--or did he? Thomas Macauley dreams his niece confesses...
YEW: by Mrs. Cl. of S.; 1670 or 71; a risky dream-prescription.
In a dream, a dead friend told Mrs. Cl. how to cure her daughter's chronic illness: the yew tree. But yew is toxic...
SAINT HELENA: by Edmund Halley; 1676, a predictive dream.
Astronomer Edmund Halley had dreamed of sailing to St Helena in the South Atlantic,
but until he arrived hr didn’t realize how accurate his dreams had been...
THE BOATMEN OF LAOLONG: by Viceroy Zhu, before 1679, as told by Pu Songling; an incubated dream
Traders were vanishing. Newly installed Viceroy Zhu fasted, focused, and dreamt
the gods sent him a riddling poem. Each line suggested one word--together, they...
CAUTION: BRUTAL ORGANIZED CRIME
THE FLYING COW: by a cow-buyer, as told by Pu Songling; before 1679, a perverse predictive dream?
A farmer dreamt his new cow grew wings and flew away. Next day, he sold that cow at a heavy loss. Walking
home with the cash, he found a tame falcon, and tied its leg to his moneybag. One guess what the bird did...
PRINCESS LILY: by Dou Xun, as told by Pu Songling; before 1679: recurring psychic dreams, or fiction?
Dou dreams he marries Lily; when a monstrous snake attacks her huge family, he reluctantly hosts
them all... when he wakes, they turn out to be bees driven from their hive by a (very real) snake...
THE WOLF DREAM: by Mr. Bai, as told by Pu Songling; before 1679, a predictive dream, or fiction?
Mr Bai dreams his son the mandarin is a tiger leading a pack of wolves--all man-eaters,
at least until two angels knock out his fangs and predict he'll get beheaded soon...
CAUTION: CANNIBALS, REVENGE KILLINGS
BOTH MOURN, BOTH DIE: by "J.H., Esquire", 1694/12/9, a double premonitory dream
J.H. dreamt both his mother and Queen Mary appeared in mourning. Within days, both were dying...
STOCKDEN'S MURDER: by Elizabeth Greenwood; Dec 1695-Jan 1696, six dreams solving a murder.
Greenwood dreamt her murdered neighbor's ghost gave her tips helping her catch his three killers...
early 1700s
CRUSHED BY NETLEY ABBEY: by a Mr Taylor; 1704? A warning dream.
A carpenter demolishes a ruined abbey despite dreams he’ll be crushed by stones falling from a window...
THE DEVIL'S TRILL: by Giuseppe Tartini; c.1713, a musical inspiration dream.
I sold my soul to the Devil. On an impulse, I handed him my fiddle. To my
wonder, he played a sonata of exquisite beauty. When I woke I retained only echoes...
THE BOAT IS SINKING: by Mrs Griffiths; 1734/8/6, a recurrent warning dream
Mrs Griffiths has the same nightmare three times before she asks her nephew to skip a fishing trip...
UNSWEPT HOUSE: by Emanuel Swedenborg, 1744/4/1, a flying-searching-unreadiness spiritual dream
Swedenborg flies on horseback through a house seeking someone. One room's clean, lit, full of people, but
most are empty and dirty. Longing to meet God is not enough! He's only cleaned up one aspect of his life...
BROMAN'S DOG: by Emanuel Swedenborg, 1744/4/5, a dream of a man-serpent-dog
Swedenborg fights a worldly acquaintance, then his dog, who turns into a serpent...
CAUTION: FIGHTING, SCORNS MATERIALISM
SHAKING: by Emanuel Swedenborg, 1744/4/6, a dream of the physical side of spiritual struggle
Swedenborg shakes uncontrollably all night, releasing or discharging some strange energy.
He frames it in religious terms, but it's a phenomenon even secular writers have reported...
CAUTION: WEIRD
SWAB'S DOG: by Emanuel Swedenborg, 1744/4/8, a warning dream
Swedenborg cuddles a talking dog who asks after its old master, Swab, and then kisses
Swedenborg, grossing him out. But he wakes knowing just what his doggy pest represents...
POLITICS BITES: by Emanuel Swedenborg, 1744/4/13, a dream of... read the title!
Swedenborg's in bed with a woman, but she has teeth down there. Oh, now and she's not a woman, but
his political buddy Johan! Well, maybe it means not to get involved with women, or men, or... politics?
CAUTION: JUST WEIRD
MUSCULAR STUDY: by Emanuel Swedenborg, 1744/4/14, a sexy dream of work advice (no, really)
Swedenborg jokes with his cousin's new girlfriend as she grows bigger and
stronger and bigger and... Oh. He needs to study the muscles!
HEADSMAN: by Emanuel Swedenborg, 1744/4/17, a cannibal nightmare prefiguring Jung
Swedenborg meets an executioner who cooks the heads he chops off,
and eats them. Yet in context, the nightmare may be constructive...
CAUTION: VIOLENCE
FLYING, FIGHTING, LOVE: by Emanuel Swedenborg, 1744/4/23, a dream of... oh, guess!
Swedenborg fights a flying woman over a lake, then is in bed with another. After some
language and privacy problems, all goes so well he thinks they've made a child...
CAUTION: VIOLENCE, SEX
THE KING'S LANGUAGE: by Emanuel Swedenborg, 1744/4/24, a dream on the language of dreams
Swedenborg struggles to grasp the King's broken French. He wakes to realize he's trying to learn
a greater King's difficult language. Still relevant today, for he saw the problem's twofold: the
difficult language of images, but also issues the waking mind missed--or wants to deny!
SWORD AND BOAR: by Emanuel Swedenborg, 1744/4/30, a dream warning of excess.
A boar attacks Swedenborg's late brother, alive again. He tries to help, but the pig
eats his brother's head. That's what you get for drinking, partying, and gluttony...
CAUTION: VIOLENT DEATH
SAVED TWICE: by Emanuel Swedenborg, 1744/5/19, maddeningly brief mention of two predictive dreams.
Swedenborg dreamt of danger on his London trip, twice. Both situations then came true, but he was prepared...
CAUTION: ANNOYING TO E.S.P. SKEPTICS
IN THE FORM OF WOMEN: by Emanuel Swedenborg, 1744/7/3, the earliest recurrent dream-symbol?
Swedenborg tenderly says goodbye to a lover. A few nights later he realizes his dream lovers
repeatedly represent scholarly fields! An avid scientist, he find research as sexy as, well, sex...
WINGED BEAST: by Emanuel Swedenborg, 1744/4/7/29, a dream of fighting one's own flaws
Swedenborg fights a monster but lacks strength. Yet later, on a higher plane, he learns the beast did die...
CAUTION: VIOLENT
SWORDLESS: by Emanuel Swedenborg, 1744/8/4, a dream warning about bragging
Swedenborg gets in a duel, but his beautiful silver hilt has no sword attached. Uh-oh...
Then he's in bed and realizes he's been sexually boasting...
CAUTION: PHALLIC SYMBOLISM
DENTATA: by Emanuel Swedenborg, 1744/10/9, a dream of a toothy vagina--yet not a nightmare
Swedenborg's in bed with a woman, but finds she has teeth in her vagina. He interprets it not as revealing some
fear of women but as advice about pacing his scientific work. And the surrounding dreams hint he may be right...
CAUTION: ALMOST-SEX
THE KEY TO HIS LIFE: by an English rebel's wife; 1745; a lifesaving oracular/psychic dream.
Twice a condemned man's wife dreamt of a key lost in rubble below a wall. The second time she went out to find it...
late 1700s
REMARKABLE: by Joseph Wilkins; 1754, an out-of-body dream
Wilkins visits his parents in a dream. Only they think he's a ghost, and panic--in the real world...
DON'T GO TO THE MARKET: by a Stockwith woman, June/July 1757; a predictive dream unheeded
A woman in Stockwith dreamt she'd drown going to market; but her friends talked her back into the trip.
When she fell in the water, they all stood by as she drowned; not one helping her till it was too late...
CAUTION: WITH FRIENDS LIKE THESE...
LISTEN TO YOUR WIFE: by Edward Bennet's daughter, 1757/7/11; a predictive dream
Bennet's daughter dreamt her husband drowned after wading too deep (he couldn't swim). He promised
he'd avoid deep water, but his best friend played a prank, treading water to make it seem shallow...
CAUTION: WITH FRIENDS LIKE THESE...
SWEDENBORG'S VISIONS: as reported by Immanuel Kant, 1759-61; three solid ESP hits.
Swedenborg stuns the Queen of Sweden by whispering a secret only she and a dead man knew;
A widow begs him to ask her late husband to find a lost receipt. Swedenborg reveals a secret drawer;
Swedenborg, at a dinner party, grows alarmed by a fire that nearly burns his home--500 km away!
"I SHALL HURT YOU WORSE": by Mrs B. when young, c. 1760; a predictive dream semi-heeded
At 14, B. dreamt a stranger attacked her and hurt her badly. She said "but I'll hurt you worse." She did:
a week later that man attacked and nearly killed her. She survived to identify him--and get him hanged...
CAUTION: HARSH JUSTICE
STEPHENSON AND BELL: by Matthew Talbot; 1768, a recurring predictive dream.
A man in a blue coat on a white horse delivered papers from a nearby wrecked ship, signed Stephenson and...
SAMUEL SAVAGE: by Samuel Savage, late 1770; a dark predictive dream
Samuel Savage dreamt he rode through a graveyard and saw a new monument--for himself!
His death-date was marked: two years in the future. He died September 1772, on that day...
TREASURE UNDER STONE, or, OOPS: by Daniel Healy; Jan. 1774, a recurring dream of treasure
Daniel thrice dreamt of money hidden under a great stone in a nearby field. He dug and found a surprise...
CAUTION: IRISH HUMOR
"LOOK IN THE WELL!": by Elizabeth Harcourt; 1777/9/15, an unheeded warning dream.
Elizabeth tried to tell her dream, but her husband didn't listen. When his dad didn't show up for dinner, it was too late...
EYE-SAVIOR: by an Oldham girl, c.1784; a curative (not merely diagnostic) dream
I had gone blind in one eye. I dreamt our Savior came to me, and when I woke, I could see...
LOST ANT: by William Blake; late 1780s; a dream-poem, one of his Songs of Innocence
A glowworm and nightwatch beetle help out a lost crying ant-woman. It's not always a bug-eat-bug world...
ROBERT’S PLAN: by William Blake; late 1788; an advisory dream...
Blake was broke. Couldn’t typeset Songs of Innocence and Experience.
But in a dream, his brother advised him...
THE ANGEL: by William Blake; early 1790s; a gender-bending dream-poem
Blake dreams he's a young queen with an uneasy relationship to her guardian angel...
ROWLAND'S DREAM: by R. J. Rowland, 1790s? a dream of a useful ghost.
DAY: Rowland needed papers for a legal case, but couldn't find where his father had stashed them.
DREAM: his long-dead dad told R.J. a lawyer R.J. he'd never heard of had them, 'but the man may need
some reminding', and gave details of Portuguese gold and a drinking bout. Next day, it worked. But how?
CAUTION: GHOST? E.S.P.?
KUBLA KHAN: by Samuel Coleridge; summer 1797, an interrupted dream-poem
In Xanadu did Kubla Khan a stately pleasure-dome decree (at least till that visitor from Porlock barged in)
CAUTION: POET ON PAIN MEDS
1800
PUDDING AND FORTGIBU: lived by M. Deschamps, as told by Carl Jung; a synchronistic linkage spanning the 19th Century
As a child in Orléans, M. Deschamps got his first taste of plum-cake from a M. Fortgibu.
As a man in Paris, Deschamps saw plum cake again--but not to eat. M. Fortgibu had beaten him to it.
Many years later, Deschamps was given plum-cake. He said "All that's missing is M. Fortgibu!"...
CAUTION: TRULY POINTLESS AND THAT'S THE POINT
EBON EBON THALUD: by Samuel Coleridge; 1800/11/28, a nightmare struggle leaving physical traces.
Ebon Ebon Thalud, a woman blended with darkness, tries to gouge out my right eye. I wake screaming. My right eyelid...
OLD ADAM: by Robert Southey; 1804/12/7, a comic dreamlet.
I meet the original Adam. He complains Eve neglects him, but he hopes to meet one of his cleverer descendants...
CREATING WINGS: by Robert Southey; 1805. Beauty to nightmare to flight.
Saints and devils in a sunken statuary garden turn too real for comfort; so, creating my own wings, I fly...
TO KEEP HIM COMPANY: by Robert Southey; 1806/1/23; a Wertheresque suicide dream-comedy
My German friend resolved to commit suicide, so I agreed to poison myself to keep him company...
DEJA REVE: by Percy Bysshe Shelley; before 1810, a flash of a premonitory dream
While walking in the country, a vista suddenly terrifies Shelley: he recognizes it from a dream years before...
1810
MR. PERCEVAL'S MURDER: by John Williams; 1812/5/2-3, a recurrent predictive dream.
Thrice I saw the Chancellor of the Exchequer shot in the House of Commons. I nearly went to London...
WABOSE'S VISION: by Catherine Wabose (Ogeewyahnoquot Okwa), Feb. 1814? shamanic initiation dreams
After fasting for six days, I dreamed of three spirit helpers who aided my village,
guiding hunters toward game and healing others. But I lost so many loved ones...
CAUTION: SPOUSE MURDERED; CAREER BURNOUT
FLAYED COLUMN: by Antoine Lavalette, fall 1815; a time-compressed nightmare
In prison, the midnight bell chimed. I dreamt I saw a cavalry column of men and horses skinned, gory, still marching.
Wagons of the dead passed for hours. As the guard changed, the gate crashed, waking me--just minutes after midnight!
CAUTION: PROVES NOT ALL DREAMS ARE REALTIME
BYRON'S DREAM: by Lord Byron; 1816, a dream of a love denied
An epic dream on the lifelong effects of unrequited love, compressed into seven stanzas...
FRANKENSTEIN'S ORIGIN: by Mary Shelley; 1816/6/16, the (hypnogogic?) dream inspiring a famous book
I saw the pale student of unhallowed arts kneeling beside the thing
he had put together; I saw the hideous phantasm of a man stretched out...
MARIANNE'S DREAM: by Marianne Hunt c.1817, as told by Percy Shelley; a dream-poem.
A black anchor floats in the sky to the east. Impossible cities rise on mountaintops, only to erupt in flame.
The sea rises to drown them. On a plank, I ride the flood. In the ruins, I find angelic statues--who wake...
HELL IS HEAVEN!: by John Keats; 1819, a happy scandalous dream
I dreamt I was in the outermost circle of Dante's Hell, among condemned lovers, floating forever, in love, in bliss...
ODE TO PSYCHE: by John Keats; 1819, a poem based on a dream-encounter
Keats met two winged lovers nesting in the woods: Eros and Psyche, the last Olympians, worshipless...
LA BELLE DAME SANS MERCI: by John Keats, April 1819, a sexy nightmare poem
A knight falls in love with a fey woman, until her previous victims warn him in a nightmare that she is...
CAUTION: GOTH TO THE MAX
1820
RIB-CRUSHER: by Robert Southey; 1823/10/5, a nightmare leaving traces
I was in the grave. Worse, a living skeleton was trying to crush my ribs. Though terrified, I fought back, and...
DRAMA IS HELL!: by Thomas Hood; 1824?; a comic nightmare
When my first play failed, I tried to console myself by reading Paradise Lost.
But drama and devils don't mix...
BOGNOR MARRIAGE: by Thomas Hood; 1825; a newlywed nightmare
I found a honeymoon cottage by the sea, and the old landlady gave me a very reasonable rate. Everything was fine...
TINGLE: by Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, c.Sept. 1825, a dream of Good Vibrations
I experienced a delicious tembling throughout my being, sweeping up
from my toes to my head. It shook me to the marrow of my bones...
THE RED BARN MURDER: by Ann Marten, c. 1827/12/15 and early 1828; two possibly psychic dreams
Ann Marten kept dreaming that her stepdaughter had not eloped but was buried under a nearby red barn...
CAUTION: MURDER
TWENTY OF ME: by Robert MacNish; before 1830. A dream of multiplicity.
I possessed ubiquity: twenty of me, and each possessed by my same soul, so I could not say who I inhabited...
1830
THE AXE OF DEATH: by Catherine McDiarmid Paton; c. 1830, a grisly predictive nightmare.
She dreamt Death attacked her but her youngest kids bravely fought back--and died. 3 months later...
CAUTION: VIOLENCE
PRODROMAL DREAMLETS: by Arnaud de Villeneuve, c.1300; Conrad Gessner, 1565/12/8;
M. Teste, 1830-1848, and Maurice Macario, early 1850s? four dreams predicting illness
Dog bites doctor's leg. Snake bites scholar's chest. Apoplexy kills a
government minister. Tonsillitis flattens a sleep and dream researcher...
IRISES: by Frederic Mistral; 1834, a four-year-old's ecstatic dream
That day Frederic, craving irises, fell in the water three times. At night he swam through an iris paradise...
DREAM FIGURES: by Hervey de Saint-Denys, dreamlets between 1835 & 1865?
Why do I treat dream-figures as real people, even in otherwise lucid dreams?
And if dreams universally suspended disbelief, how did I know, in one
recent dream, that the woman I argued with was another part of me?
TWO RESCUES: by Hervey de Saint-Denys, 1836 & '60-66?, early genderbent dreams
A TAILOR'S APPRENTICE: I become her to fight back against his abuse...
DAMSEL ON THE PYRE: I become a girl being burned alive, but get
so distracted by my beautiful body I forget to escape until it's too...
EAT THE WORLD: by Ralph Waldo Emerson, between Jan 1838 & Nov 1839; a dream of surreal advice
I was floating in the Ether, not far from this world, which seemed small as an apple.
An angel took it in his hand and brought it to me and said, 'This must thou eat'...
CRYPTOMNESIC SHOP: by Hervey de Saint-Denys, c.1839, an early cryptomnesic dream
A charming street, a peculiar shop... imaginary, or not? Saint-Denys found it
at last, years later, in Frankfurt where he hadn't been since childhood...
1840
AGASSIZ’S FISH: by Louis Agassiz, ca. 1840: subliminal, psychic, or just a great guess?
Agassiz, faced with a fossil he had to crack open, was unsure where to strike.
But for three nights he dreamed...
YATAGHAN: by Hervey de Saint-Denys, c.1840?, a dream of rescue--and summoning
Night street. Two masked assassins attack a woman. I intervene. But I need a weapon!
I picture the Turkish sword on my mantel. The yataghan appears in my hand and I...
THE WORLD NEWS: by Nathaniel Hawthorne; 1843; a dream-job (and career advice?)
I dreamt the world itself hired me, at a generous salary, to report its great affairs exactly as they happen...
TOASTING FORK: by Charles Dickens, August 1843, a surreal tragicomic dream.
A gentleman clad but in a sheet notified me that an old friend had died of a terrible disease. What disease? Well...
MISS NAPIER: by Charles Dickens, probably 1840s, a brief, specific predictive dream
I dream I meet a lady in red named Miss Napier. I know no such person. Senseless! Next evening,
after I read onstage, friends enter my dresssing room to introduce me to the lady in red--Miss...
MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS' JEWELS: 1845, a hypnotic experiment by a Major Buckley
Mary Queen of Scots' will (1556) was lost for centuries. In 1845, Major Buckley hypnotized
a fellow officer and had him 'read' a family heirloom. He said it was Mary's! Her lost will
was found in 1854 and published in 1863. Turned out the claim in the trance was right...
CAUTION: MARY'S LIFE WAS BRUTAL
SEWING ADVICE FROM CANNIBALS: by Elias Howe, 1845, an inventor's helpful nightmare.
His sewing-machine design failed--until dream-cannibals caught him & jabbed him with weird needles...
CAUTION: OUCH!
COCKEREL: by Hervey de Saint-Denys, 1846, a comic transformation dream
I meet King Louis-Philippe, but as I recall his symbol, the cockerel, he transforms to suit.
Now he cannot read the letter presented to him, so it becomes a basket of bird-seed...
SHELL AND STONE: by William Wordsworth; late 1840s, a dream of a new Great Flood
An Arab shows me a stone he calls a book, and a prophetic shell that warns of a flood rushing toward us...
ESCAPE: by Harriet Tubman; 1848?-49, recurring dreams of freedom
I dreamed of flying like a bird over beautiful meadows to a border or river I couldn't cross. But ladies in white
helped pull me over. After I did escape, I met some of those ladies and knew by their faces who I could trust...
1850
LAYANASHA'S DREAM: by Layanasha, laibon of the Maasai, c.1850, a prophecy spanning 65-70 years
Layanasha foresaw the British would bring a great snake spanning Maasai territory, then a plague killing
half the tribe, a second plague killing nearly all the cattle, and finally huge birds flying over the veldt...
OTTER MEDICINE: by The-Fringe, a Crow healer, early 1850s; a shamanic dream with physical effects
I slept on an island in a scalding hot spring, praying for a dream. I got one--and woke up on the shore...
SENTENCED TO CHEESE: by a Birmingham physician; early 1850s? a classic subliminal nightmare
One night as I slept over a cheese shop, I dreamt I was trapped in a huge cheese, as a rat-horde gnawed...
CAUTION: YOU ARE LUNCH
GOLD EGG: by James Russell Lowell: 1850s? a dream-poem
I dreamt a couple toss out a shabby old hen. But it lays golden eggs! She becomes an eagle and carries me off to...
HER DEAD BROTHER: by a Bereaved Lady, as told by Hervey de Saint-Denys, 1850s?
Saint-Denys pushes a strange theory of dream-incompetence, using as an example
a woman's dream of grief over her brother, killed in a war. But her case suggests
a second explanation a 19th-century scholar isn't equipped to see ...
PRODROMAL DREAMLETS: by Arnaud de Villeneuve, c.1300; Conrad Gessner, 1565/12/8;
M. Teste, 1830-1848, and Maurice Macario, early 1850s? four dreams predicting illness
Dog bites doctor's leg. Snake bites scholar's chest. Apoplexy kills a
government minister. Tonsillitis flattens a sleep and dream researcher...
STEVENSON'S BROWNIES: by Robert Louis Stevenson; 1850s-1880s, a series of dreams
Stevenson's dreams changed over decades: from childhood nightmares into
creative collaborators dreaming whole stories...
"DEATH! DEATH!" by William Holman Hunt; 1854/1/20 (or so); a one-year predictive dream
DREAM: Hunt's mother points at a tall figure in the shadows and shrieks "Death! Death!"
ONE YEAR LATER: in Jerusalem, his hostess finds her young son dead, and shrieks...
CAUTION: BEWARE THE IDES OF JANUARY?
CRAZY HORSE'S DREAM: by Crazy Horse; summer 1854 (age 11-12) a life-predicting dream
I saw a man riding across the face of a lake. Bullets and arrows flew at him, but all missed.
He reached the shore. Men who looked like him rose from the ground, and pulled him down...
CAUTION: GENOCIDE DIRECT, GENOCIDE BY PROXY
CROCODILE KING: by Christina Rossetti; 1855/3/9, a weird dream-poem she may have faked.
On the Euphrates, a monstrous crocodile eats all his kin. But when a winged ship appears, he feigns remorse...
SEVASTOPOL: by Sydney Dobell: 1855/9/8, an apocalyptic, possibly psychic dream
A friend scoffed at Biblical talk of the apocalypse, but as we spoke, the evening star came down and burned all our
cities. I knew it was no ordinary dream. Next day came the news: the Russians had burned the city of Sevastopol...
CAUTION: WAR CRIME
RIVER CROSSING: by Harriet Tubman; mid to late 1850s; a lifesaving intuition
Leading a party out of slavery, I got off the road when God warned me to. He insisted I must ford a cold river.
Turned out the slaveowner had posted a reward at the station ahead; we were saved by divine guidance...
UTE RAID: by Hasteen Hon's grandmother, c.1856 or c.1873, a possibly lifesaving dream
When my grandmother was young her husband had a prosperous ranch. She dreamed some Indians attacked.
She convinced them to hide; the Utes killed or stole nearly all their sheep. But at least they were alive...
SUCH STUFF AS DREAMS ARE MADE OF: by John Anster Fitzgerald, 1857?, dream painting
In bed asleep, the dreamer discovers this seemingly empty room hosts a
fairy ball, full of luminous half-seen beings serenaded by a monstrous band...
SNOT-BIRD FORGERY!: a dream by Samuel Pepys, 1667/6/29, & a nightmare by Thomas Macaulay, c.1857
Samuel Pepys dreamt of kidneystones, pee, come, & snot--or did he? Thomas Macauley dreams his niece confesses...
COUNT COUP!: by Plenty Coups, 1857; a child's defining dream
I sought a dream of Helpers. But rather than give me gifts, they gave me a daunting challenge...
BUFFALO PERSON: by Plenty Coups, summer 1857; a child's time-traveling, tribe-saving dream
I was led into the future, where all the buffalo disappeared, to meet a frail old man by a ranch house...
THOREAU'S MOUNTAIN: by Henry David Thoreau, 1857/10/29, a recurring hypnogogic dream
I dreamt again of that mountain east of Concord where no hill exists. I ascended that long
rocky ridge where wild beasts haunted, into a superterranean grandeur and sublimity...
JOHN BROWN'S DEATH: by Harriet Tubman; 1858/4, recurring predictive dreams
I saw a snake with a white-bearded man's head, and two younger heads alongside. Men attacked the
snake, cutting off the younger heads. The eldest looked at me, mournful, and they cut off his head too.
Soon after, I met John Brown; I knew it was him. But only on the day of Harper's Ferry did I understand...
TWAIN'S BROTHER: by Mark Twain, early May 1858, a premonitory nightmare.
My brother Henry lay in a metal casket. He wore a suit of mine. On his breast were white roses, with
one red at the centre. A few days later, the boilers of the riverboat Henry worked on exploded...
KEKULE: by Friedrich Kekulé, 1858 & 1865, two problem-solving dreams.
Kekule dreamed solutions to the thorniest structural chemistry problems of his era not once but twice...
IRONFALL: by William Henry Hudson; 1859, the first dream of an extinction event?
I saw a dark object like a cloud at a vast height, but coming swiftly down toward the earth.
It resolved itself into iron bars--tens of thousands, millions? I said: this is the end of everything...
1860
EMANCIPATION: by Harriet Tubman; c. 1860/1/1, a dream looking three years ahead
Tubman woke ecstatic, unable to eat. "My people are free!" Her host said "My grandchildren may see it; but we will be gone."
"No! I tell you, sir, you'll see it, and you'll see it soon. My people are free! My people are free!" Three years later...
CAT AND MOUSE: by Hervey de Saint-Denys, early 1860s?, a startling dream image
A lab. The cat doesn't mind a swim in this liquid harmlessly rendering it clear as glass. It catches
a transparent mouse I didn't even see! So now I faintly see a glass mouse inside the glass cat...
FLYING MACHINE: by George B. Burgin, c.1860 on, a recurrent flying dream
When I'm stressed, I build a set of luna-moth wings and fly invisibly. Though once a blind man caught me by ear...
OUT OF BODY TO THE MOON: by Hervey de Saint-Denys, 1860?-67? Early out-of-body dream
I rise out of my body, find I'm invulnerable, visit the moon, with its volcanic rocks, re-enter
my body, "wake" and write the dream--only to wake again and find all my notes gone!...
PERFUMES: by Hervey de Saint-Denys, early 1860s? Experiments in scent-triggered dreams
I trained myself to associate one scent with the mountains, one with an art studio. On a random
night my servant applied both secretly, and I dreamt artist & model burst into a mountain scene...
SYLVIA, OR, PUN-DREAMS: by Hervey de Saint-Denys, early 1860s? 4 dreams of French puns
A comet grows hair, a girl named Rosalie becomes a bed of roses, writing in a beautiful
hand appears on a beautiful hand, and Sylvia becomes a talking forest bird...
TWO RESCUES: by Hervey de Saint-Denys, 1836 & '60-66?, early genderbent dreams
A TAILOR'S APPRENTICE: I become her to fight back against his abuse...
DAMSEL ON THE PYRE: I become a girl being burned alive, but get
so distracted by my beautiful body I forget to escape until it's too...
BRIDGE-GUARD: by Alfred Maury, early 1861?; one of the first cryptomnesic dreams recorded
I found myself in childhood again, in a village where my dad was building a bridge. A man in a guard's
uniform introduced himself as C--. Awake I could recall no such person, but research revealed...
WHITE-FACED: by John A. Symonds; 1861/7/3, a mutation nightmare
My face was leprous white like parchment; my eyes shone with
a cold blue eerie light. I shrieked "Papa, don't you know me?"...
DELBOEUF'S FERN by Joseph Delboeuf; 1862; the first cryptomnesic dream quoted by Freud.
Delboeuf, ignorant of botany, dreams of feeding lizards a fern called Asplenium ruta muralis;
years later he finds both lizards and fern in books he read and forgot years before the dream...
SABOTAGED BOAT: by C. G. "Chinese" Gordon; c.1861-4, a recurrent warning dream
I recognized the saboteur. If I had neglected that dream warning we all would likely have drowned...
PALAIS IDÉAL: by Ferdinand Cheval; dreamed 1864, built 1879-1912, a life-defining dream
I dreamed I built a palace, but for fifteen years I kept silent, ashamed. Then
I tripped over a beautiful stone. I took it home. Next day I collected more...
GUILLOTINE: by Alfred Maury; 1865, a dream researcher's most inexplicable dream
They led me to the guillotine. As the blade struck my neck,
I woke to find my headboard had broken loose and fallen on my...
WHISTLE: by Dr William Hammond, c.1865; a self-flagging predictive nightmare
On a long steamboat voyag, a living skeleton swaps a warning for my watch; when the whistle
sounds, the boiler will blow. As it does, I dive in the river and wake to discover a real whistle...
CAUTION: UNCANNY SYNCHRONIZATION?
LINCOLN'S ASSASSINATION DREAM: by Abraham Lincoln, ca.March 31 1865, a predictive nightmare.
Lincoln dreamt his body was lying in state in the White House. A guard said he'd been assassinated. Two weeks later...
FANNY SEWARD'S DEATH: by Harriet Tubman; 1866/10/29, a psychic dream
I saw a chariot fly south then return with the cold body of my friend. I ran into town to warn them
"Miss Fanny's dead!" As I reached town, the news came, confirming her death...
NIETZSCHE EATS A TOAD: by Frederick Nietzsche; c.1867; a (prodromal?) nightmare
At a party, Nietzsche told a young woman "my hand was transparent as glass;
and a fat toad sat on my hand. I felt compelled to swallow it, and did..."
CAUTION: CREEPY DREAM, CREEPY FOLLOW-UP
POEM COMPOSED IN SLEEP: by Lidian Emerson, 1867, a lyrical love poem.
Will you walk in the fields, love? / Let us be gone.
The tall grass will wave to thee / Fairest one...
SAVONAROLA: by Mrs C., circa 1867; a dream mocking excess self-criticism
Mrs C. dreamed she was the ascetic preacher Savonarola, who wanted to burn all vanities.
In her audience she saw... Mrs C! So she, Savonarola, aimed her barbs at all of C's flaws...
VOLITION ON THE BRINK: by Dr William Hammond, c.1867.
I'm on a mesa, looking down in terror. I try to pull back but a compulsion
overrides my will--I crawl helplessly forward until I go over. As I fall...
CAUTION: PRE-FREUDIAN DISMISSAL OF WARNING
THUMBSUCKER!: by a patient of William Hammond, c.1868, an epic comic taste dream
I paint my thumb with bitter aloes to break my habit of sucking it at night. I dream of
wormwood, ox gall, mineral salts. I consult Dr. Save Me and even the Pope, but...
HOT FEET: by Patient 2 of William Hammond, c.1868, a nightmare--but subliminal or mystical?
I'm in the Rocky Mountains. Gold-hungry Mexican bandits capture me and put my feet to the fire,
demanding "How do you transmute copper into gold?" I scream "I don't know!", waking to find...
CAUTION: TORTURE PLAYED FOR LAUGHS
THE PERIODIC TABLE: by Dmitri Mendeleev; 1869/2/17, a dream solving a key scientific problem
"I saw in a dream a table where all the elements fell into place as required. Awakening, I immediately wrote it down..."
MUIR AND BUTLER: by John Muir, August 2-4 1869; an intuition acted on.
Sketching on North Dome, thinking only of the glorious Yosemite landscape, I was suddenly
possessed by the notion that my friend Professor J. D. Butler was below me in the valley...
LAMIA by Wayan, 1988/11/1 with a nightmare by John Ruskin, 1869/11/1
I ask my dreams about sex, and get... sex on a beach with a sea-serpent girl--a lamia. But she gets queasy--
landsick! Too hot for her up here. Help her back in the sea. What a contrast with Ruskin's lamia nightmare...
CAUTION: SCALY SEX
1870
HORSE THIEVES: by Plenty Coups, early 1870s?; a practical psychic or subliminal dream
Thieves stole 100 of our horses. The tracks suggested white men, but that night
my dream Helpers declared them Sioux. We tracked them across Montana...
ALICE'S POEM: by Lewis Carroll; 1872, a poem on dreams
Are dreams really so ephemeral? Lewis Carroll, who built the Alice books from dream-shards, wasn't so sure...
DONE FOR: by the Reverend Francis Kilvert; 1872/10/14, a nightmare within a nightmare
I dreamt a friend poisoned me. I "woke" and slew him in fury. But guilt gnawed me. I confessed and was due to hang...
CAUTION: NOT A CALM GUY
UTE RAID: by Hasteen Hon's grandmother, c.1856 or c.1873, a possibly lifesaving dream
When my grandmother was young her husband had a prosperous ranch. She dreamed some Indians attacked.
She convinced them to hide; the Utes killed or stole nearly all their sheep. But at least they were alive...
THE TEACHER: by Lord Vivian, 1874; a predictive dream he bet on... for another!
DREAM: a stranger tells me "The Teacher" won the Handicap. AWAKE: At the track I meet the man in my dream! He
says The Teacher is now called Aldrich. But Aldrich's owner discourages me. A friend trusts my dream & wins £1,000...
PLANET-SCULPTING APE: by "AE" (George Russell); mid-1870s, a childhood characterological dream.
On a cloud in space I met an ape molding a model of Earth, glancing at the original far below. We were much alike...
THE WORM: by Emily Dickinson, mid-1870s?, a nightmare-poem
Emily Dickinson ties up a worm she mistrusts. Bad move! It grows into a talking snake with a score to settle...
THE DOOMED TRAIN: by Anna Kingsford; Nov. 1876, a galvanizing political nightmare
We were on a train headed for a crash. No one was in the engine. Rather than jump, my friend insisted we try...
WONDERFUL SPECTACLES: by Anna Kingsford; 1877/1/31, a clairvoyant advisory dream
A mystic postman delivers a letter on the world's best glasses and a reply from me, telling how to find them...
THE ENCHANTED WOMAN: by Anna Kingsford; Feb. 1877, an epic prehistoric dream.
Goaded by a green spirit of envy, an Ice Age sorceror kidnaps Adam's Eve, arresting human evolution...
PAUL AND THE DISCIPLES OF JESUS: by Anna Kingsford; 1877/7/17, an indignant channeled dream
Jesus's disciples kvetch that Paul, who never knew Jesus, twisted his clean simplicity into a religion...
CAUTION: JARGON, HERESY (on one side or other)
DIVINE IMAGE, or, A VISION OF ADONAI: by Anna Kingsford, 1877/7/23, a waking vision
Gazing at the moon, Anna finds herself touring the Solar System, meeting all the planetary guardians...
CAUTION: MYSTICAL ECSTASY
BIRD, CAT, TREASURE: by Anna Kingsford; 1877/8/3, two warning dreams in one night
Should Anna quit hiding her psychic dreams? She dreams a cat eats her bird & burglars loot an open house.
Maybe keep hiding?
A DIFFICULT PATH: by Anna Kingsford; 1877/11/3, an advisory dream.
I lead my daughter up a thorny path; she’s getting scratched. She'd rather stay in that fishing village below...
THE MAN-EATER: by Carl Jung, 1879; a precocious formative nightmare.
Jung (at age three and a half) sees a terrifying god deep underground, and is told "That is the man-eater!"...
TWO POLLYS: by Lewis Carroll; 1879/5/15, a dream of psychological splitting.
With no sense of incongruity, I planned to take the child Polly
with me to the theatre, to see the grown-up Polly act...
THE BLOOD OF CHRIST (BUT, MOM!): by Anna Kingsford; 1879/10/17, a doctrinal dream gets personal
I say Christ’s “blood” is a metaphor for “spiritual perfection.” My mom says "You're killing me; please repent"...
TURNABOUT: by Henry James; 1870s or 80s; a nightmare reversed by sheer courage.
A night-fiend strove to open the door I held shut between us--
until I realized I too was terrible, and opened it to find a great...
CAUTION: THE DREADED PROSE OF HENRY JAMES
WHITE LOON: by White Loon, 1870s?, an initiation-negotiation dream
At ten, I fasted a long tedious time. I dreamed a bird offered me showy gifts, but I kept to my grandmother's advice: never take the
first offer. At last a big, strange bird from the north, a white loon, offered me long life and health; that I accepted! So now I'm called...
1880
ALBATROSS LOVE: by Havelock Ellis; c. 1880?, a dream of unrequited love
An albatross with beautiful eyes transformed into a woman. But her nose remained a beak! She asked...
THE OTHER LAND: by Walter de la Mare, c.1881-4; an episodic or "installment" dream series
Age 7 to 11, I often dreamt I inhabited a consistent geography of mountains & deserts. I was an adult of dark
complexion in non-European clothes; I spoke a tongue (and read a script) that I didn't recognize when awake...
CAUTION: ADULT DRUG EXPERIMENT; PAST LIFE MEMORY?
VICARIOUS ATONEMENT: by Anna Kingsford; 1880/1/31, an anti-shamanic dream
Kingsford meets a girl who burns herself as a protest. K flips out! Rants instead of helps...
CAUTION: RANT MIDWAY YOU'RE BETTER OFF SKIPPING
THE LABORATORY UNDERGROUND: by Anna Kingsford; 1880/2/2; an animal-rights nightmare.
I find myself in a vault with tables where half-dissected animals writhe. Hidden in each was a human shape...
CAUTION: GRUESOME
THE OLD YOUNG MAN: by Anna Kingsford; 1880/2/21, a dream of a step-in soul
Malaria nearly kills a talented young artist; he must retrain from scratch. Why? Well, he's not exactly himself...
THE WORK OF POWER: by Anna Kingsford; Dec. 1880, a wildly uncompromising dream-sermon
A dream telling how to acquire mystic power: raw food, no sex, meat, or booze; just meditate in rural solitude...
CAUTION: EXTREMISM
GLADSTONE AND DISRAELI by Edward Maitland, 1881/2/1; a character-reading dream
The two great political leaders of the Victorian Age bare their souls to me. Gladstone's ashamed that
he betrayed his ideals; Disraeli dances about, vilifying his loathed rival, but he feels no shame at all...
CAUTION: VICTORIAN PROSE, BAD POLITICIANS
THE THREE VEILS BETWEEN MAN AND GOD: by Anna Kingsford, March 1881, a messianic dream.
I was shown what veils the God in us: Blood (violence), Idols (dogmatism), and the Curse of Eve (sexism)...
CAUTION: FUNDAMENTALISTS (OF ANY FAITH) WILL SEE RED
THE GOLDENE BOOK OF VENUS: by Anna Kingsford; 1881/3/15-16, a poem read in two dreams
Poem from a book on how love can save lives & souls, read in two dreams of a Renaissance astrologer's library...
THE LORD CHANCELOR'S NIGHTMARE: by Gilbert & Sullivan; 1882, a comic song-lyric on insomnia
The Lord Chancelor can't sleep, and when at last he does, he drifts through nightmares full of baby lawyers
and potted tradesmen sprouting fruit, and cutthroat corporate scheming. But that's Victorian dreaming!
THE DREAM: by Pierre Puvis de Chavanne, c.1882: a temptation dream?
Subtitled "In his Sleep he Saw Love, Glory and Wealth Appear to him". Is it a real pre-Freudian dream
on being tempted by three powerful allies of the Id... or just allegory? I have my doubts...
A GAME OF CARDS: by Anna Kingsford; 1883/12/7, a god kibitzes on a Tarot game
Anna trusts to luck, but her mentor urges her to plan--"Think it out!" And what are these cards?
MESOPOTAMIAN RINGS: by Herman Hilprecht, Jan.-Mar. 1883; two problem-solving dreams
I dreamt of a better translation of Nebuchadnezzar's name, since universally accepted...
I dreamt a priest of old Nippur told me two agate pieces, long separated, formed a pair...
CUT THROAT: by Dr. Walter Bruce, 1883/12/27; a psychic nightmare
I saw one man stalk another. Unprovoked, he cut his throat. I felt I knew him but couldn't see his face...
That night, my brother-in-law was brutally murdered in just this fashion, outside a wedding party...
CAUTION: GRIM. 19TH-CENTURY GRIM.
THE OTHER LAND: by Walter de la Mare, c.1881-4; an episodic or "installment" dream series
Age 7 to 11, I often dreamt I inhabited a consistent geography of mountains & deserts. I was an adult of dark
complexion in non-European clothes; I spoke a tongue (and read a script) that I didn't recognize when awake...
CAUTION: ADULT DRUG EXPERIMENT; PAST LIFE MEMORY?
A STAY OF EXECUTION: by John Lee; 1885/2/22, a miracle-predicting dream
John Lee, sentenced to hang, dreamt he walked to the scaffold but the trapdoor stubbornly stuck.
He woke, told his jailors the dream, walked to the scaffold, and...
REVELATION: by Anna Kingsford; 1885/11/27, a prophetic, almost messianic, dream.
Dreams and other revelations shouldn't be dissected--they need to be reveiled, not revealed...
CAUTION: INTENSE MYSTICISM
LINES COMPOSED IN SLEEP: by Owen Meredith; before 1887; a Kubla-Khanlike poem-shard
I dreamt an epic poem on a sinister ruined city now home
only to reptiles. I woke with at least a hundred lines, but...
A HAUNTED HOUSE INDEED!: by Anna Kingsford; 1887/4/12, an epic ghost dream
I was warned about soul-devouring art in the haunted house, but I didn't expect to find an entire art salon...
CAUTION: ABSORBING ARTWORK
A SQUARE IN THE HAND: by Anna Kingsford; 1887/4/12, an epic nightmare with a twist
I'm a French revolutionary facing a firing squad. But palmistry predicts I'll be strangely saved...
WOLVES SITTING IN A TREE: by Sergei Pankejeff; winter 1888 or '89, a nightmare Freud made famous
When I was very small I dreamt a pack of wolves climbed the tree outside my window and
somehow got it open. Freud told me I must have seen my parents having sex doggy style...
CAUTION: REALLY, DR. FREUD?
SKY-BOAT: by J.W. Dunne, c.1889; a long-term predictive dream
As a child I read Jules Verne's Clipper of the Clouds--a metal craft with many propellers on spars, not wings.
Soon I dreamt I designed & flew quite a different craft, like a small boat of canvas on a wood frame.
20 years later, I was test-flying a new aeroplane with a boatlike cockpit of white canvas on a wood...
1890
EGYPT: by AE (George Russell); 1890s?, a brief telepathic vision
I wondered where a friend was, and felt as if I were walking at night near the Sphinx. Months later...
A HANDELIAN CONCERT by Samuel Butler, 1890s?; an orchestral blowout dream
Glaciers feed a mountain lake; dust blows over a pass. Then I realize the ice is the robes
of a great choir; the dust, thousands of musicians filling the cirque, singing, playing...
THE SHOP SPILLED OVER: by AE (George Russell); early 1890s, a telepathic flash
Closing my eyes I saw an old man and a red-haired girl in a shop. My workmate was writing home...
CYCLES AGO: dream by Maud Gonne, poem by WB Yeats; late July 1891, a dream-poem
We were as if brother and sister of old in the desert land;
they sold us in slavery together before this life had begun...
SLEDDING NEAR C: by Albert Einstein; around 1890-95; a transcendent career-advice dream
Sledding at night, I approached the speed of light, and the stars turned colors I'd never seen...
FLAMING LEAVES: by Dr. Adele A. Gleason and John R. Joslyn; 1892/1/26, a shared dream.
Adele: alone & scared in a dark wood--but her friend John came & shook a tree; it burst into flame!
John, the same night: found Adele scared in a dark wood. Shook a bush & it burst into flame...
SPECTER OF THE BROCKEN: by Carl Jung, c.1893; early dream proposing the Shadow
Jung walked against stiff wind and fog, sheltering a tiny light, generating a huge eerie shadow--his other self!
He concluded this was his life-task--to nurture his spark of awareness & rationality in the dark. But...
In hindsight his dream models four key Jungian ideas: Self, Ego, Shadow and Unconscious--at age 18!
CAUTION: REJECTS JUNG'S OWN DREAM INTERPRETATION!
A GANG OF GHOSTS: by "Mrs. Claughton", 1893/10/14, recurrent dreams of ghosts
Mrs Claughton moved into a house known as haunted. She dreamt multiple ghosts asked her for help.
She crossed England to pass messages to heirs, containing private details Claughton couldn't have known...
CAUTION: ENOUGH CORROBORATION TO MAKE SKEPTICS UNEASY
PLAYMATES: by J.S., c.1893, a childhood dream
When I was little, two boys with strange laughs invited me to play. Their house was crowded and underground.
After I came back out, I realized their home was a grave and they were ghosts. They gave me a power...
MARCO TO WIN: by Violet Tweedale, 1893 or 4; a predictive... something
We went to visit a well-known psychic. As an afterthought I asked about an upcoming race. The answer was firm: "Marco to win..."
We made a lot off her tip. But when I thanked her later, we were shocked to learn she'd never heard me! Then who had spoken?...
CAUTION: WEIRD EVEN FOR SPIRITUALISTS
SKYLIGHT: by an Honorable Lady; before 1894, a crimesolving dream (psychic? subliminal? ghost-visit?)
My dead father said a trusted servant was stealing our goods through an unlocked skylight. This proved true...
HE HAS REPENTED: by Frederick Greenwood; before 1894, a pre-Freud discovery of the unconscious
A con artist fools me and a waiter. But if my dreamfolk are all me, who's fooling whom?
HER HAND ON THE MANTEL: by Frederick Greenwood; before 1894; a disowned predictive dream
Greenwood dreams he finds a severed hand on a mantelpiece. The next day
it happens! But he sees no moral, so he dismisses it...
THE PHOENIX: by A.C. Benson; 1894. A dream-poem.
I don't understand this poem's symbolism or even its style. It came to me whole, in a dream...
THE SMILING SHAW MACHINE: by W.B. Yeats; 1894/4/19, a nightmare about popular success.
After Shaw's Arms and the Man eclipsed my own play The Land of Heart's Desire, I dreamt I was haunted by...
WALKER'S DREAM: by Madame C.J. Walker; c.1895, a dream-cure that worked AND made her rich
My scalp had an infection that just wouldn't heal. I tried everything. Then I dreamed I met
a big, black man who advised me to use certain ingredients from Africa...
LINCH-PIN: by George Stevens; c.1895? a frustrating psychic dream
George sees a cart-crash pinning a friend. He yells to bystanders to free the wheel, but they can't hear him...
LANDSCAPE FROM A DREAM: by Paul Nash; recurrent dreams 1895-9, painted summer 1937
As a child, Paul Nash dreamt he flew over rural southern England.
As an adult surrealist painter...
FLIGHT, MARGARET, MOUSE, DOG: by Paul Nash, dreamed 1895-9 + Feb. 1913; art by Dave McKean
As a child, landscape artist Paul Nash dreamed of flying over the countryside
of southern England. But he was threatened by the legendary Black Dog...
WORLDSTONES: dreamed fall 1895 & Aug 1898 by Mark Twain, & 2002/6/27 by Robert Moss
Mark Twain dreams we're cells inside God, and writes of Huck Finn among the microbes.
A century later, unaware of Twain's dreams, Robert Moss...
LONGEVITY ROAD: by J.S., c.1898, a predictive life-arc dream
I walked along a hilly road with ropes and boxes. My wife vanished in a hollow. But
my path went on until the hills were blue in the distance. An old man interpreted...
TITAN: by Morgan Robertson, 1898; a fiction that came uncannily true
14 years before the Titanic sailed, Robertson wrote of a great liner, the Titan,
with 3000 people aboard, that strikes an iceberg and sinks in the North Atlantic...
HALF PAST FOUR: by J.W. Dunne; 1899, a dream of clocks and time
I say it's 4:30 PM; the waiter says 4:30 AM! I wake in the night to find
my watch says 4:30, but it's stopped! I wind it, and next morning...


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