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3. Early man was extremely keen in observing the signs of nature - it was necessary for his survival. In the Kalahari desert, for instance, any little stick or straw might tell where the hunted for animal had moved. For the Polynesians signs were equally important in order to navigate safely. For long voyages the stars were used as guides. During the day navigators observed the sea and sky for indications of the weather (clouds, birds moving etc), and during the nights they could rely on the eternal stars for guidance. They certainly knew that moon was always turning her face towards earth, her back side was never visible. The signs on her face were always there. In spite of extremely long voyages that did not change. However, a remarkable fact was observed - the orientation of her face changed. For instance did the waxing moon crescent turn around when the equator was crossed:
Close to the equator the moon crescent looks like a canoe. Travelling far north the well known moon turns upside down. Also the star constellations behave in the same way - in the far north they always are upside down, inverted. I guess this phenomenon is what once led the creator of the rongorongo system to decide that every other text line should be inverted. In other words, if there were e.g. 8 + 8 text lines on a tablet, then it could give room for describing 16 halfyears, the path of the sun during 8 years. I do not say that any of the surviving rongorongo texts really is a calendar for 8 years, I am just pointing out the possibilities which a system of inverted boustrophedon offers. And I cannot find any other reasonable explanation for inverting every other text line.
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