were so concerned with this belief that they would undergo purification rituals and meditation before even attempting to start a new blade, for fear that they might inadvertently create an evil sword. The Vikings prized their swords above all other things, handing them down from generation to generation and giving them names. The value of the blade was not only determined by its quality but also by how many battles that it was used in. Polynesian people such as the Māori also had comparable reverence for their weapons. They believed a weapon contained a spiritual force called mana and that the weapon held the spirits of its maker, its line of owners and also stole the spirits of those it killed. These weapons where highly prized for their mana and cherished as heirlooms. The Samurai of Japan believed that their swords had their own soul that could possess them. It was not the wielder but their swords that desired to kill; Samurai were just the instrument that the sword used to complete that task. Since most of them were Buddhists (a religion that finds violence and murder abhorent), that train of thought gave them some peace of mind in their killing vocation. Later, as the concept of demons, spiritual possession, and elementals entered the realm of mythological themes, it was only a natural leap to attribute magical properties of the swords of folklore to indwelling spirits. Magic swords may exhibit various degrees of sentience, from being merely influenced by the wielder to being able to think for itself or even control its owner. Biblical The Bible relates in the Book of Genesis how God, seeking to deter Adam and Eve from returning to the Garden of Eden, "placed at the east of the garden of Eden Cherubim and a flaming sword which turned every way". By some accounts, the Cherubim are replaced with the Archangel Michael, who wields a similar weapon. King David was given the sword of the slain giant Goliath by the priest Ahimelech, to which was attached extra-biblical mythology and traditions. In the Book of Revelation, Jesus is symbolically described wielding a double-edged sword that proceeds out from his mouth, in reference to the "sword of the spirit" which is the "word of truth". Mythological Arthurian In the legend of King Arthur, the king himself is related to two magical swords, in most variants. The first is