next page previous page table of contents home

There are now only a few glyph lines remaining on the Mamari tablet and I have begun to think of what should be done next. And I think it should be to document some of all the myriad of discussed ideas in a more easily accessible way.

Therefore I decided to add new comments to some of the earlier pages. To begin with I have added a new and independent page to my earlier first comments regarding line Ca1. In its 'tool bar' I have inserted a new option, viz. a + sign which leads to the added new comments:

next page previous page + table of contents home

Below is a copy of these new comments:

 

Further comments:

Equinox   Side a
March 21 22 (81) 23 24 389
no glyph
Ca1-1 Ca1-2 Ca1-3
koia ki te hoea ki te henua
Al Fargh al Thāni-25 ε Phoenicis (0.8) Uttara Bhādrapadā-27 / Wall-14 θ Andromedae (2.7), ζ Tucanae (3.5)
0h (365.25) ALGENIB PEGASI (1.8), χ Pegasi (2.1)
Caph, SIRRAH (0.5)
September 20 21 (264) equinox 23
12h (182.6) Minkar (183.7), ρ Centauri (183.9) Hasta-13 / Chariot-28 Zaniah (185.8), Chang Sha (186.3)
Alchita, Ma Wei (183.1) Pálida (184.6), Megrez (184.9), GIENAH (185.1), ε Muscae (185.2)

The right ascension data are coordinates of space to be used in nighttime to find the stars. But they can also be used to define the time in the night or in the year. The web of coordinates appears to be moving both during the night and in the year, and this illusion is caused by the movements of the Earth (around its axis respectively around the Sun).

Also the Gregorian calendar is used as a guiding map of time for the solar year and therefore the right ascension data can be arranged in parallel with the Gregorian dates. I have done so in order to connect our well know calendar with our less known right ascension map and from there to the positions of the stars in the sky.

The 'first point of Aries' means 0h = spring equinox north of the equator, conventionally defined as March 21 (although the date varies slightly from year to year).

Time flows and the first notch for a 'night' (day) cannot be counted and carved into the wood until the first day has been measured in full. Therefore Ca1-1 should correspond to the completion of the first day at the beginning of the 2nd day of such a year which is beginning with March 21. Similarly cannot the first day of the 2nd half of the year be noted down until the beginning of its 2nd day.

Metoro said ki te hoea when commenting on Ca1-2 and it was may have been his way of telling Bishop Jaussen that this was the equinox when the light halfyear changed to the dark halfyear. March is not a spring month south of the equator but its opposite.

Hoe

Hoe 1. Paddle. Mgv.: hoe, ohe, id. Mq., Ta.: hoe, id. 2. To wheeze with fatigue (oeoe 2). Arero oeoe, to stammer, to stutter; Mgv. oe, to make a whistling sound in breathing; ohe, a cry from a person out of breath. Mq.: oe, to wheeze with fatigue. 3. Blade, knife; hoe hakaiu, clasp-knife, jack-knife; hoe hakanemu, clasp-knife; hoe pikopiko, pruning knife. 4. Ta.: oheohe, a plant. Ma.: kohekohe, id. Churchill.

T. Paddle. E hoe te heiva = 'and to paddle (was their) pleasure'. Henry.

Hoea, instrument for tattooing. Barthel.

Although the glyph in question is not a hoea type of glyph but its opposite:

hoea Ca1-2 tara

The arrival of the famous manu tara birds to Easter Island each year was a sign of spring, of light returning. Tara means a point and these birds have pointed beaks:

The '1st point of Aries' (March 21) is south of the equator reflected by a corresponding spring equinox named the '1st point of Libra' (September 22) - although both these denominations nowadays are misleading because neither the March equinox nor the point at the opposite side of the year are in the Aries respectively the Libra constellations. The precession of the equinoxes has moved these points of sunlight earlier in the year. The stars Sirrah (α Andromedae) respectively Gienah (γ Corvi) could instead be regarded as marks of the current equinoxes.

Summer is longer north of the equator than south of the equator. Therefore the September equinox is arriving 2 days later than at 12h. In rongorongo times 12h was the position of Alchita (α Corvi) - the first of the stars in the black Raven constellation. But according to our Gregorian calendar precession moves the stars ahead with ca 1 day in about 71 years and today Alchita is rising with the Sun around the September equinox.

Instruments for tattooing (hoea) must have sharp points in order to engrave black curves in the skin:

... He continued travelling until he reached the house of Uetonga, whose name all men know: he was the tattoo expert of the world below, and the origin and source of all the tattoo designs in this world.

Uetonga was at work tattooing the face of a chief. This chief was lying on the ground with his hands clenched and his toes twitching while the father of Niwareka worked at his face with a bone of many sharpened points, and Mataora was greatly surprised to see that blood was flowing from the cheeks of that chief. Mataora had his own moko, it was done here in the world above, but it was painted on with ochre and blue clay. Mataora had not seen such moko as Uetonga was making, and he said to him, 'You are doing that in the wrong way, O old one. We do not do it thus.'

'Quite so,' replied Uetonga, 'you do not do it thus. But yours is the way that is wrong. What you do above there is tuhi, it is only fit for wood. You see,' he said, putting forth his hand to Mataora's cheek, 'it will rub off.' And Uetonga smeared Mataora's make-up with his fingers and spoiled its appearance. And all the people sitting round them laughed, and Uetonga with them ...

Soot is what remains after a fire has died out. It signifies 'no longer light and warmth'. The manu tara birds have been named 'sooty tern' but this is misleading, because in front they are quite white.

Manu tara

Sooty tern. The names of the age levels of the sooty tern were earlier used as children's names (Routledge). These names were (Barthel): pi(u) riuriu, kava 'eo'eo, te verovero, and ka 'ara'ara. Fischer.

Tara

1. Thorn: tara miro. 2. Spur: tara moa. 3. Corner; te tara o te hare, corner of house; tara o te ahu, corner of ahu. Vanaga.

(1. Dollar; moni tara, id.) 2. Thorn, spike, horn; taratara, prickly, rough, full of rocks. P Pau.: taratara, a ray, a beam; tare, a spine, a thorn. Mgv.: tara, spine, thorn, horn, crest, fishbone. Mq.: taá, spine, needle, thorn, sharp point, dart, harpoon; taa, the corner of a house, angle. Ta.: tara, spine, horn, spur, the corner of a house, angle. Sa.: tala, the round end of a house. Ma.: tara, the side wall of a house. 3. To announce, to proclaim, to promulgate, to call, to slander; tatara, to make a genealogy. P Pau.: fakatara, to enjoin. Mq.: taá, to cry, to call. 4. Mgv.: tara, a species of banana. Mq.: taa, a plant, a bird. Ma.: tara, a bird. 5. Ta.: tara, enchantment. Ma.: tara, an incantation. 6. Ta.: tara, to untie. Sa.: tala, id. Ha.: kala, id. Churchill