Abstract
Some time ago I wrote a little book on Roman religion which was favored with a courteous and thoughtful review by a scholar from whom I have learned much, S. Weinstock. My central contention was that the Romans had an idea corresponding closely to the Melanesian and Polynesianmana, the North Americanorendaorwakanda, and similar notions elsewhere, and that they denoted it by the wordnumen; that is to say, thatnumensignifies a superhuman force, impersonal in itself but regularly belonging to a person (a god of some kind) or occasionally to an exceptionally important body of human beings, as the Roman senate or people. This force, I argued, the Romans supposed could be to some extent directed to serve their own ends; a god could be induced to employ hisnumenfor such things as giving fertility or victory to his worshippers, and on occasion an inanimate object, such as a boundary-mark, could havenumenput into it by the appropriate ceremonial. Also, thenumenof a god could be and was increased by offering him a sacrifice of the proper kind.
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