[Polynesian] Nearly all languages had a cognate of this word, the basic meaning of which was maternal power, moon-spirit, magic, supernatural force, and a title of the Goddess. Mana came back into English from anthropological studies in the South Pacific, where the word was described as follows: Mana is the stuff through which magic works...proceeding immediately from the nature of the sacred person or thing, or mediately because a ghost or spirit has put it into the person or thing...The cult of the relics of the saints springs from the belief that their bodies, whether living or dead, possessed Mana. Mana also ruled the underworld, which the Finns called Manana. The Romans knew her as a very ancient Goddess Mana or Mania, governing the underground land of the long dead; the ancestral spirits called manes, her children. They dwelt in a pit under the lapis manalis in the Forum, emerging to receive their offerings on the annual feast day of the Maniae. On this occasion the Goddess Mania appeare...
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