GESTURES the gesture of the manufica can either be done with the right and left; the act of tightening the thumb between the index and middle fingers is a gesture of defiance that in popular belief; serves to remove the influences of evil people and the evil eye in general. The gesture is taken as an amulet that depicts him; known in antiquity to the Greeks and the Romans that even then; he attributed the meaning of invocation. Woodcut; Italy circa 1850