Indeed, the very name Tarot has been deemed by some authors as positive proof that the cards are the unbound leaves of one of the great books of the Temple of Thoth Hermes Trismegistus, since they derive the word Tarot from Thoth or else from Thror Tahar, which, says Wilkinson (Volume II, page 90), "were the parchment records kept in the Temple, which are mentioned in the time of the eighteenth dynasty that were written on skins." The same author states (page 207) that "Thoth framed the laws." In fact, his temple was the seat of all learning, where doctors, lawyers and scientists were able to study and to devote their knowledge to the god they worshipped. It seems, therefore, that the name is in truth one of the links in the chain of evidence proving that what we use as playthings were once part of the great cult of Mercury and his African or Asian _confrères_, in whose time the pictures and the emblems were thoroughly understood and were regarded with awe or reverently consulted, since by their means alone could the wishes of the gods be made known to mortals, through the medium of the priests of Mercury, Thoth, or Nebo. The intimate connection of the triple god is no fanciful suggestion, but is acknowledged by all students. Nebo, of the Babylonians (mentioned in the Bible), Thoth, of the Egyptians, and Hermes, of the Greeks, were all worshipped as gods of speech and inventors of transmitted ideas. It is not credible that in Asia or Africa, even as early as the twelfth dynasty, that voice language or speech was a gift newly granted to mankind, so there must have been some reason for the belief that "these gods gave speech to mankind." This is one of the superstitions puzzling many modern students who have tried to investigate the mysteries of the Temple of Thoth. It is now believed that one of the priests who was connected with the cult conceived the bright idea of communicating the wishes of the planets, of the vegetable and the animal kingdoms, as well as those of the patron gods, to mankind through a well-arranged system that had the Temple of Thoth for a centre and its priests as interpreters. The power that this system would give to the learned men congregated in the vast Temple of learning would be great, and would increase their prestige to a wonderful extent. Before that time the primitive people were content with simple means of consulting the wishes of the gods, or with the decrees written at the birth of each child on the tablet of fate by "the writer of Esigalia, who was called Nebü." The means generally resorted to were those still common in Korea, Japan and China, where the oracle is consulted by throwing a handful of sticks before a shrine. Among the Arabs a sheaf of arrows is used. Gordon Cummings describes his negro servants using sticks which were marked and then thrown on the ground, when the natives desired to be told by their gods where the game lay and what direction to take when hunting.