To open the mouth (of a fish, vaha mea) or the beak (of a bird, moa) at the break of 'dawn' is a way to stay in tune with the horizon in the east opening up to let the sun come out again.
If the mouth / the beak is closed it is dark and sun is not present:
When the ancient Egyptians raised their statues the ceremony was called the Opening of the Mouth. At the opposite end we find the idea of breaking the staff, Hatinga Te Kohe, at 12 * 29.5 = day 354. If the 'sky propper' is breaking, then the sky roof will come down upon us like a black cloth. Though to break the silence is to open the mouth and be a part in the game of life again. It is the female sign of life, whereas the male sign of life is his 'staff' moving upwards. We can see it in the moa prototype. We are not amused, said Queen Victoria. "Now Susanowo was banished from the sky for having thrown the hind part of this backward-flayed piebald stallion in the weaving hall of his sister Amaterasu. These sudden discourteous gestures seem to be part of the code: Enkidu had thus thrown the hind quarter of the Bull of Heaven in the face of Ishtar, but here there is an additional code feature (it is code) of the backward-flayed animal. Susanowo's gesture caused the Sun-lady to withdraw in anger into a cave: the world was plunged into darkness. The 80,000 gods assembled in the Milky Way to take counsel, and at last came upon a device to coax the Sun out of the cave and end the great blackout. It was a low-comedy trick, part of the stock-in-trade that is used to coax Rā in Egypt, Demeter in Greece (the so-called Demeter Agelastos or Unlaughing Demeter) and Skadi in the North - obviously another code-device. The obscene dance of old Baubo, also called Iambe in Eleusis, parallels the equally unsavory comic act of Loke in the Edda. The point in all cases is that the deities must be made to laugh ..." (Hamlet's Mill) I would rather say that the point is to entice the deities to 'come out in the open' by way of opening their mouths. This will cause them to move. In the Eskimo myth about the Entrail Snatcher (mummies have no intestines) a ridiculous dance is also used: ... Finally, at one time, he could really be heard to enter to them, he, the poor cousin of the Moon, the entrail-snatcher, carrying a dish and a large knife, in order to try to snatch the entrails of the human being. And look! At the window his wife stood and kept on saying: 'She smiles!' The entrail-snatcher began to dance a drum dance, with ridiculous movements, and they only looked at him, while he sang: My little dogs, I get them food, / My little dogs, I get them food, / ha-ahing, ha-ahing, ha-ahing. While he acted thus, his poor wife all along stood at the window saying: 'She smiles, she smiles, she smiles!' She was tremendously busy telling her husband that she smiled. At last she could hardly let be smiling when looking at him, but she placed her hands under the front part of her fur coat and blew violently, as the Moon had told her to do. And indeed he took himself off, the entrail-snatcher, over there, saying: 'One with blubber (i.e., a bear) is heard!... The poor wife stays at the window (it is underlined), i.e. at the opening. To stay unmoved the woman hides her hands (not to let them be engaged in any dangerous business). And by blowing violently she established a further security, connecting herself with a later time, when the neck of the King has been broken and the torrents have been let loose: ... Pure O picked up a large round stone (pureva) and hit the top of the figure. Because of the stone, the neck of Oto Uta was broken.Then the wind started blowing, the billow rose, the waves broke, the rain started falling, the flame (i.e., lightning) shone brightly, and the thunder rolled. As soon as the wind started blowing, the waves broke, the rain fell, and thunder rolled, King Hotu knew that Pure O had done harm to Oto Uta ... |
