AGYRTÆ, in antiquity, a kind of strolling impostors running about the country, to pick up money by telling fortunes at rich mens doors, pretending to cure diseases by charms, sacrifices, and other religious mysteries; also to expiate the crimes of their deceased ancestors, by virtue of certain odours and fumigations; to torment their enemies, by the use of magical verses and the like. The word is Greek Ἀγυρταί, formed of the verb ἄγω, I congregate; alluding to the practice of Charletans, who gather a crowd about them.