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"Shand, whose patient research into the traditions of the now-extinct Moriori furnishes the only authentic information about these unfortunate people, enumerated the twelve years of their cycle as follows:
The first five names contain hiti, which Shand translated 'jumping'. It is the Maori whiti (Hawaiian hiki) which signifies 'rise' or 'shine' as applied to heavenly bodies and is also found in tawhiti or tahiki 'borders' or 'distant lands'. But Moriori traditions refer to the earliest settlers of their islands as the Hiti, 'Ancient Ones'; hence it would seem that Hiti had acquired the meaning 'ancient' with them. The significance of the first three names of the cycle thus becomes Ancient or Rising Earth, Ancient or Rising Heaven, and Ancient or Rising Sun. In contrast with the first five names which contain the word 'ancient' the last five, with one exception, containt the word muru which Shand identified with the Maori muri, 'later' or 'last'. Muru-whenua, for example, is 'later land'. Shand states that Muru-whenua and Muru-angina resemble Maori names for certain winds, but he was unable to obtain any illumination on these year names from any native of his times. The fifth name of the cycle is derived from the Maori kaupeka, 'branch', applied to branches of knowledge and to branches of the year or months. The Maori Whiti-kaupeka is the name of the star Spica in Virgo. Among the Marquesans, Hiti-kaupeka was one of the trinity of sky deities and visited the earth occasionally in the form of a bird. The names of the years of the Moriori cycle may commemorate a cosmological sequence beginning with the rising of the ancient earth from ocean depths, the lifting of the sky, and the first rising of the newly created Sun. Since Poroporo (Porapora) in the sixth term is a well-known geographical name brought into the Pacific from far-western lands, it is possible that the middle names refer to the branching off of the remote ancestors of the Moriori from the main stock and their subsequent migrations. Thus the last five names may refer to the later stages of the long journey which brought them first to New Zealand and finally to the inhospitable Chatham Islands." (Makemson) |
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My comments: 1. Translating hiti as 'jumping' evokes the season of 'spring', the time when the calves are jumping around, forcing the sky roof to stand higher. A calf is not only a young bull (Taurus) but also the part of the leg above the knee (cfr at ika hiku): ... To flex the knees lightly, as used to do the youths of both sexes when, after having stayed inside for a long period to get a fair complexion, they showed themselves off in dances called te hikiga haúga, parading on a footpath of smooth stones, with their faces painted, lightly flexing their knees with each step ... 2. The sequence nuku, ragi, raa agrees with my idea that the year is beginning when spring Sun (Raa) has left, with day (64 + 236) + 1 from winter solstice. The beginning of the new year is a dark time. 3. Hiti is not hita. Therefore the first 3 years of the 12 constitutes a separate group. It resembles the first 3 star 'pillars' of Tahiti: Ana-mua (Antares), Ana-muri (Aldebaran), and Ana-roto (Spica), entrance, rear, and middle. It could mean that nuku corresponds to beginning, ragi to end and raa to center. In the beginning there is no light and at the end the spirit will rise to heaven. Only in between (in summer) are we truly living. 4. The following 9 years will then be a 2nd (Moon-oriented) group of years, and the names are dividing these 8 + 1 years into (I guess) waxing (hiti), apex (haga), waning (muri), and rebirth (dark Moon):
5. If the Moriori system for the 12 years was a reflection of their 12 months, which I suspect, then the structure indeed becomes 5 + 2 + 5, with poroporo quite similar to poporo. At hua poporo I wrote: ... The 'berries' in the hua poporo glyphs indicate how the 'fruits' are ripe for harvest, they will fall and a new dark season will enter (popo). The 'balls' (popo) announce the coming drops. Maybe - as if by sympathetic magic - the fruits will fall with the rain ... 6. Hiti-kaupeke apparently is the 5th and last of the season of growth ('jumping'), and then comes the middle of summer (2 peaceful months named haga). 'Branches' is the numerous last offspring of the tree of growth:
Then comes first signs of the new year, the 'black fruits' (hua poporo). The middle of the year therefore consists of the 5th and 6th of the 12 months. The star which announces this midseason is Ana-roto (Spica, Whiti-kaupeka). With 5 and 6 located in the middle, we must have 10 months, not 12. |
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In G the season of hua poporo, so to say, arrives with glyph number 185, which agrees with how the Moriori fishermen located their year To Whanga-poroporo according to my interpretation above:
After 29 glyphs a maitaki sign evidently announces the beginning of a new period. Though Gb2-16 (as in 216 = 6 * 36) apparently marks the end of the hua poporo season. 272 - 184 = 88 glyphs, and 472 - 88 = 384 = 184 + 200:
The offspring (hua) come after spring, and their measure is 8 times 'one more' (than 10). |
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