Laudator Temporis Acti

Georg Luck, Arcana Mundi, 2nd ed. (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2006), p. 460 with note on p. 475:

The case of Sophronius, bishop of Tella (fifth century), is truly amazing, even though, as a supporter of Nestorius, he may be classified as a heretic.¹⁰ The magical experiments of this dignitary of the Church were described by two presbyters and two deacons before the "Robber Synod" of Ephesus in 449 and denounced by the assembled clergy. Someone had stolen a sum of money from the bishop. He gathered the suspects and first made them swear on the Gospel that they were innocent. Then he forced them to undergo the "cheese-sandwich oracle" (tyromanteia). The sandwiches were offered, and the bishop attached a conjuration to a tripod. In principle, the thief would have been unable to eat, but apparently all the suspects ate with a good appetite. So the bishop insisted on another oracle, the phialomanteia: he consulted a spirit that was supposed to appear in a dish into which water and oil had been poured. This method finally revealed the thief.

10. See G. Luck, in Ankarloo and Clark, Witchcraft, pp. 155–56.

Georg Luck, "Witches and Sorcerers in Classical Literature," in Bengt Ankarloo and Stuart Clark, edd., Witchcraft and Magic in Europe: Ancient Greece and Rome (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1999), pp. 91-156 (at 155):

In a chapter entitled 'Die geheimen Praktiken eines syrischen Bischofs', E. Peterson (Frühkirche, Judentum und Gnosis, Herder 1959, pp. 222-45) deals with a fascinating testimony which has been overlooked by many historians of witchcraft in antiquity. It is found in the records, written in Syriac, of the so-called Robber Synod of Ephesus, 449. Here, Sophronius, the Bishop of Tella is accused not only of being a heretic, but also of being a magician and an astrologer.

The Bishop had lost a sum of money while traveling. He rounded up some suspects and made them first swear on the Gospel that they were innocent. Then he forced them to undergo the 'cheese-sandwich' test (tyromanteia).

In a note (p. 334, n. 2) Peterson documents how often people went to consult magicians when they had lost money or had been the victims of theft. Apuleius (Apologia 42) had read in Varro that Nigidius Figulus, the famous occultist, thanks to his gift of clairvoyance, once apprehended a thief, and Porphyry, in his Life of Plotinus 11, tells a similar story of the great Neoplatonist who had a special gift of emblepein, 'visionary intuition'.

As the cheese-sandwiches were offered, the Bishop attached the following spell to a tripod: 'Lord Iao, Bringer of Light, deliver the thief I am looking for,' observing the suspects, because the one who was unable to eat his sandwich must be the thief. The test was inconclusive (apparently all the suspects ate their sandwiches). The Bishop next tried phialomanteia. He poured water and oil into a bowl. We must assume that either Sophronius himself or a medium then conjured up a daemon or a ghost (of a biaiothanatos, i.e. a murder victim or a suicide) and asked who the culprit was. This operation was successful.

Peterson's book is unavailable to me, but cf. S.G.F. Perry, The Second Synod of Ephesus, Together with Certain Extracts Relating to it, from Syriac MSS. preserved in the British Museum...English Version (Dartford: The Orient Press, 1881), pp. 191-193 (notes omitted):

Once upon a time as he was travelling, he happened to lose a considerable amount of gold; and when his suspicion rested on certain persons and he had made them take an oath upon the Evangelists (in the matter), not satisfied with this he, further, testing them by the ordeal of bread and cheese like the heathen, compelled them to eat. And, when he still did not find (the money), he prepared himself (and used) a divining Cup; affirming that "the money is to be found with such and such a persona whose name is so and so, and who is clothed in such and such a way." And many times the Daemons, wishing to confirm him in the imposture, pointed out the thief, not because they wanted to convict him (the thief), but because they were eager to plunge (overwhelm) the Bishop in ruin.

Liddell-Scott-Jones, s.v. τυρόμαντις:

one who divines from cheese, ARTEM. 2.69.

Artemidorus 2.69 just lists cheese-diviners in a list of types of charlatans, without any more details.

Papyri Graecae Magicae V.200-212, tr. W.C. Grese, in Hans Dieter Betz, ed., The Greek Magical Papyri in Translation, 2nd ed. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992; rpt. 1996), p. 104:

Take a tripod and place it on an earthen altar, offer myrrh, frankincense, and a frog's tongue. Take unsalted winter wheat and goat-cheese, and give to each 8 drams of winter wheat and 8 drams of cheese while saying the following formula (inscribe this name and glue it underneath the tripod): "Master IAŌ, light-bearer, / hand over the thief whom I see." If one of them does not swallow what was given to him, he is the thief.

The Greek, from Karl Preisendanz, ed., Papyri Graecae Magicae, Vol. I (Leipzig: B.G. Teubner, 1928), p. 188 (vertical line separators omitted):

λαβὼν τρίποδα ἐπίθεϲ ἐπὶ βωμὸν γήϊνον, ἐπίθυε ζμύρναν καὶ λίβανον καὶ γλῶτταν βατράχου, καὶ λαβὼν ϲελίγνιον ἄναλον καὶ τυρὸν αἴγειον δίδου ἑκάϲτῳ ϲελιγνίου δραχμὰϲ η΄, τυροῦ δραχμὰϲ η΄ ἐπιλέγων τὸν ἑξῆϲ λόγον. ἐπίγραφε δὲ τοῦτο τὸ ὄνομα καὶ ὑποκόλληϲον τῷ τρίποδι. ῾Δέϲποτα Ἰάω, φωϲφόρε, παράδοϲ φῶρ’, ὃν ζητῶ’. ἐὰν δέ τιϲ αὐτῶν μὴ καταπίῃ τὸ δοθὲν αὐτῷ, αὐτόϲ ἐϲτιν ὁ κλέψαϲ.