Maniae

{{Short description|Spirits personifying insanity in Ancient Greek mythology}}

In Ancient Greek mythology, the Maniae or Maniai ({{Langx|grc|Μανίαι|Maniae}}; sg. {{lang|grc|Μανία}}) are the spirits personifying insanity, madness, and crazed frenzy. They operate closely with Lyssa, the spirit of rage and rabies, and like Lyssa, are presumed to be daughters of Nyx.{{cn|date=April 2025}} They are also associated with the Erinyes, the three fearsome goddesses of vengeance.

They are also sometimes said (though, perhaps in jest, or as a metaphor for love's sometimes cruel nature) to have been nurses of the god Eros.

Mythology

Pausanias writes that on the road from Megalopolis to Messene there was a sanctuary, which, according to local citizens, was devoted to goddesses called Maniae, and that its surrounding district was also called Maniae (Μανίας). His local sources told him that it was there that madness overtook Orestes, hence Pausanias's view that these Maniae were the vengeful Furies or Erinyes or Eumenides (Graceful Ones).Pausanias, [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0525.tlg001.perseus-grc1:8.34.1 8.34.1]

Note

References

Pausanias, Description of Greece with an English Translation by W.H.S. Jones, Litt.D., and H.A. Ormerod, M.A., in 4 Volumes. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1918. {{ISBN|0-674-99328-4}}. [http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.01.0160 Online version at the Perseus Digital Library]
Pausanias, Graeciae Descriptio. 3 vols. Leipzig, Teubner. 1903. [http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.01.0159 Greek text available at the Perseus Digital Library].

Category:Greek goddesses

Category:Personifications in Greek mythology

Category:Insanity