Long before CMOs began embracing algorithms and databases to drive their decisions, direct marketers of old believed their fortunes rose and fell according to the whimsy of a host of mythical gods and goddesses.

As a result, many prayed to a wide variety of business deities, hopeful that their earnest supplications would one day fall on caring celestial ears … and, along the way, entice more customers to swing by the ol’ merchant stall for that half-off deal on myrrh.

Ever diligent, our editors went in search of the last vestiges of these once-legendary gods, spending countless hours scouring age-old ruins and ancient texts in a painstaking effort to glean all we could. That, or we just made all this up.