väki

▪ Finnish mythology

      supernatural power believed by the Baltic Finns to reside in those natural sites, objects, and animals that for various reasons attracted popular attention and inspired strong emotional attachments. Väki was often conceived of as an impersonal power, akin to the Polynesian mana, but it also referred to the agents of the power, diffuse spiritual entities that frequent natural sites or man-made places, such as cemeteries or other religious locales that evoked strong emotional reactions. People with special gifts, seers, were able to see the true nature of these powers, more specifically, the individual spiritual entities that constituted what was generally conceived as a vague impersonal power.

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