Oneirologist

The term Oneirologist designates a certified practitioner of dream-reading whose competence is recognized under the Third Concordance and whose instruments are inspected under the Office of Metrological Assurance. Oneirologists are not, as is sometimes supposed, interpreters of dreams in the ordinary sense; the Tower maintains no office for that. An Oneirologist instead attests to the provenance of a dream — where it was had, under what registration, and by whom it may lawfully be discharged. The distinction is set out in the founding line of the Oneirological Society's Articles: "The Oneirologist does not say what a dream means. The Oneirologist says whose it is." (Oneirological Society, Articles of Association, Preamble)

The profession is old, licensed, and frequently at odds with itself. Its practitioners are counted among the most meticulously recorded of the Tower's certified trades, and among the least agreed upon as to what, precisely, they do.

Certification and the Discernment phase

Certification proceeds through the Oneirological Society, which admits candidates as Junior Somnambulist Recorders and advances them by examination. The final examination, known as the Discernment phase, is governed by Supplement 44-Δ of the Third Concordance and requires the summoning of a certified Oneirologist — a provision that the Society has twice petitioned to have clarified, since the candidate is in most cases already in the room.

The most distinguished graduate of this route was High Oneirologist Aris Thorne, who entered as a Junior Somnambulist Recorder and was later appointed to the high office by Third Concordance Decree 42-17Σ-α. His tenure as custodian of the Sleeping Annals is treated in the Society's instructional literature as exemplary, and his testimony before the Commission on Ephemeral Holdings remains the standard citation for the definition of affect. The later conflation of his office with another catalogued under the same name — recorded as Entry 562 — is not held against him, and the Society asks that candidates not raise it during examinations.

Instruments of the trade

The Oneirologist's working apparatus is modest and heavily regulated. The Oneiroscone is the principal instrument of provenance; the Lucid Bronze bell is rung to close a reading; and small quantities of the alloy's filings are carried in a sealed thimble for the marking of disputed ground. All instruments are weighed and sealed annually by the Office of Metrological Assurance, and an Oneirologist found carrying an unsealed thimble is reported to the Society within the fortnight.

Artefacts recovered in the course of practice are lodged with the Dream Registry under the classification Class-3 Oneiric Artefact, usually by the Oneirologist personally, since the Registry will not accept them from an assistant. The Lucid Vault holds the sealed stock. A reading may not be conducted on a floor above the practitioner's own certification unless a second Oneirologist is present and standing; the second Oneirologist is not permitted to sit down, a rule introduced after the incident on Floor 14307 and never rescinded.

The dispute over method

Two schools contend for the discipline. The Instrumentalist School holds that provenance is a measurable property of the dream and that the Oneirologist's task is to take the measurement correctly, using certified instruments and no intuition whatsoever. Against this, the Memorialists — so called for their reliance on the Sleeping Annals — maintain that a dream's owner is known only by its resemblance to dreams previously recorded, and that the Oneirologist is therefore a reader of precedent rather than a surveyor.

The Fifth Concordance favours the Instrumentalists, requiring instruments "of proven registration and no other means" (Fifth Concordance, ch. 9, cl. 4). The Ninth Concordance, promulgated eleven years later, appears to favour the Memorialists by directing the Oneirologist to "consult the Annals before the instrument" (Ninth Concordance, ch. 2, cl. 11). The Tenth Concordance resolves the matter by declaring both Concordances to be in force and instructing practitioners to satisfy whichever is cited against them. Practitioners have adapted, as practitioners do.

Oneirologists before the Commission

The Commission on Ephemeral Holdings has heard Oneirological evidence on nine recorded occasions. The most consequential was the testimony of Aris Thorne concerning the nature of affect, which the Commission received in a closed session and quoted at length in its Fourth Report. The Commission's practice of summoning a certified Oneirologist to attest to anything it cannot date has drawn a protest from the Society, which observes that its members are not a general-purpose dating service; the protest was entered into the record and no further action taken.

A separate matter, Thorne v. The Registry, established that Senior Librarian M. Thorne of the Dream Registry was not related to the High Oneirologist, despite the shared surname and the Registry's initial refusal to release holdings on that ground. The ruling is now cited whenever a Registry clerk hesitates over a name, which is often.

Objections, and the inventory of a reading

Not everyone holds the profession in esteem. The Office of Metrological Assurance has twice recommended that Oneirological instruments be withdrawn from free circulation, noting that the Oneiroscone's drift rate exceeds its own tolerance by a factor of three. The Society's answer — that the instrument's drift is itself diagnostic — has never satisfied the Office, and the exchange has run, in sealed correspondence, for sixty-one years.

What a reading actually produces is a short inventory, filed with the Registry and copied to the Society. A complete inventory from a reading conducted at the Lucid Vault in the winter of the year the Society records as 42-17Σ contains the following:

• one sealed thimble, unopened;
• three leaves of Registry paper, two legible;
• one witness, standing;
• the reading itself, which is not retained and is not counted as an item;
• one bell, struck once.

The inventory is signed by the Oneirologist, the witness, and — where the reading concerns a floor above the practitioner's certification — the Registry clerk, who initials the top corner and takes a copy.

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An Oneirologist is addressed in writing as "the Oneirologist of record" and in person by surname. The Society maintains that the office is not a form of sleep and has asked, without success, that the Tower's floor directories stop listing its members under Dreams, Interpretation Of. The listing remains.