AFRATUS, literally denotes a blast of wind, breath, or vapour, striking with force against another body. The word is Latin, formed from ad to, and rare to blow. Naturalists sometimes speak of the afflatus of fowls. Tully uses the word, figuratively, for a divine inspiration; in which sense he ascribes all great and eminent accomplishments to a divine afflatus. The Pythian priestess being placed on a tripod or perforated stool, over a hollow cave, received the divine afflatus, as a late author expresses it, in her belly; and being thus inspired, fell into agitations, like a phrenetic; during which, she pronounced, in hollow groans and broken sentences, the will of the deity. This afflatus is supposed, by some, to have been a subterraneous fume, or exhalation, wherewith the priestess was literally inspired. Accordingly, it had the effects of a real physical disease; the paroxysm of which was so vehement, that Plutarch observes it sometimes proved mortal. Van Dale supposes the pretended enthusiasm of the Pythia to have arisen from the fumes of aromatics.