"... The practice of turning down the fingers, contrary to our practice, deserves notice, as perhaps explaining why sometimes savages are reported to be unable to count above four. The European holds up one finger, which he counts, the native counts those that are down and says 'four'. Two fingers held up, the native counting those that are down, calls 'three'; and so on until the white man, holding up five fingers, gives the native none turned down to count. The native is nunplussed, and the enquirer reports that savages can not count above four ..." (Dr. Codrington in Melanesian Languages, p. 222, note 1, as related in Churchill 2)

According to this idea, when we in Aa8-30 are observing a sign like a closed fist quenching the 'fire' (presumably the light of the old year) there may be an additional meaning:


Aa8-26	Aa8-27	Aa8-28	Aa8-29	Aa8-30	Aa8-31

The 5 flames around the 'disc' of the 'fist' is in harmony with a gesture of all five fingers closed (= 5). Here the sun (hetuu) cannot be drawn with the usual 6 flames.

Possibly 10 will be expressed as two closed fists, for instance in the pare glyph Pa3-3:

114		415		493		133
	Pa3-3		Pa10-1		Pb9-33
	115		531		1025
	*416 = 16 26**		*494 = 19 26**		1
	*910 = 7 13 * 10**
*1024 = 2 2 * .... * 2 (10 times)**

The number of glyphs in the P text is 599 (side a) + 559 (side b) = 1158, which can be expressed as 1024 + 1 (Pb9-33) + 133 (7 * 19). Another possibility is 1158 = 35 * 26 + 1 + 247 (13 * 19).

Here the two fists presumably refer to the 10 'months' of the sun, otherwise probably also expressed by 1024 (the number of glyphs from the beginning of the text at Pa1-1 to Pb9-33).