GENIAL, an epithet given by the Pagans to certain gods who were supposed to preside over generation.
The genial gods, says Festus, were earth, air, fire, and water. The twelve signs, together with the sun and moon, were sometimes also ranked in the number.
* GENII, a sort of intermediate beings, by the Mahometans believed to exist between men and angels. They are of a grosser fabric than the latter, but much more active and powerful than the former. Some of them are good, others bad, and they are capable of future salvation or damnation like men. The orientals pretend that these genii inhabited the world many thousand years before the creation of Adam, under the reigns of several princes, who all bore the common name of Solomon; that falling at length into an almost general corruption, Eblis was sent to drive them into a remote part of the earth, there to be confined; and that some of that generation still remaining were by Tahmurath, one of the ancient kings of Persia, forced to retreat into the famous mountain of Kaf; of whose successions and wars they have many fabulous and romantic stories. They also made several ranks and degrees among this kind of beings (if they are not rather different
Genioglossi different species); some being absolutely called Jin; some Peri, or fairies; some Div, or giants; and others Tactwini, or fates.