Editing Augur (section)

===Evasion===
The interpretation of signs was vast and complex, and magistrates devised protective tricks to avoid being paralysed by negative signs.<ref>See Ovid, ''Fasti'' 3.339–344, for an instance in the conversation between king Numa and Jupiter.</ref> Against the negative ''auspicia oblativa'' the admitted procedures included:
* actively avoiding seeing them
* ''repudiare'' &ndash; refuse them through an interpretative sleight of hand
* ''non observare'' &ndash; by assuming one had not paid attention to them
* declaring something that in fact had not appeared
* ''tempestas'' &ndash; choosing the time of the observation at one's will
* ''renuntiatio'' &ndash; making a distinction between observation and formulation
* ''vitia'' &ndash; resorting to acknowledging the presence of mistakes
* repeating the whole procedure.