2. We should not jump to conclusions. Instead, let us build our picture on the myths, the stars, and the G text.
Allen: "The Late Almagest of 1515 gives this [ζ Sagittarii] as Ascella, i.e. Axilla, the Armpit of the figure, still its location on the maps ... With σ, τ, and φ it formed a portion of the 18th manzil, Al Na'ām, or Al Na'āïm al Sādirah, and the whole of that nakshatra; but the corresponding sieu included λ and μ with φ as the determinant." ... Kaus Borealis, the Northern (part of the) Bow, was Al Tizini's Rā'i al Na'āïm, the Keeper of the Na'ams, the uncertainty as to the meaning of which has already been noticed; but Kazwini evidently understood by it Ostriches, for in his list it is, with the stars μ, Al Thalimain, plainly meaning these desert birds. With the same stars it may have been the Akkadian Anu-ni-tum, said to have been associated with the great goddess Istar... My comment: Another mystery is evidently solved here too, viz. the star name Toliman (α Centauri). I think it is a corruption of the Arabic Al Thalimain, The Ostriches. The ostrich is a peculiar bird because it keeps its head down in the sand, unable to see anything. I suspect it illustrates how Sun late in the year is moving closer and closer to the horizon, threatening to disappear completely - which it does in midwinter for an observer close to the pole. The ostrich has a very great egg which could symbolize Sun at winter solstice ... (Cfr at The Croquet Ground.) The figure of the armpit implies 'giving strength' we have learnt: ... A very detailed myth comes from the island of Nauru. In the beginning there was nothing but the sea, and above soared the Old-Spider. One day the Old-Spider found a giant clam, took it up, and tried to find if this object had any opening, but could find none. She tapped on it, and as it sounded hollow, she decided it was empty. By repeating a charm, she opened the two shells and slipped inside. She could see nothing, because the sun and the moon did not then exist; and then, she could not stand up because there was not enough room in the shellfish. Constantly hunting about she at last found a snail. To endow it with power she placed it under her arm, lay down and slept for three days ... (Cfr at The Rain God.) ... Why should the armpit be a source of strength? Easy to answer for some living at high latitudes: When your fingers get numb from the cold it is easy to warm them under your arms, where they quickly will recover from the warmth generated in the armpits ... ... Betelgeuze is from Ibt al Jauzah, the Armpit of the Central One; degenerated into Bed Elgueze, Beit Algueze, Bet El-geuze, Beteigeuze, etc., down to the present title, which itself also is written Betelgeuse, Betelguese, Betelgueze, Betelgeux, etc ... (Cfr at The Armpit.) Ogotemmêli is both explicit and enigmatic (cfr at Toki): ... The most important of all drums, he said, was the armpit drum. The Nummo made it. It consists of two hemispherical wooden cups connected through their centres by a slender cylinder. It is like an hour-glass with a very long narrow neck. With this instrument tucked between his left arm and armpit, the drummer, by pressing on the hollow structure of thin wood, can tighten or relax the tension on the skins and so modify the tone. 'The Nummo made it. He made a picture of it with his fingers, as children do today in games with string.' Holding his hands apart, he passed a thread ten times round each of the four fingers, but not the thumb. He thus had forty loops on each hand, making eighty threads in all, which, he pointed out, was also the number of teeth of his jaws. The palms of his hands represented the skins of the drum, and thus to play on the drum was, symbolically, to play on the hands of the Nummo. But what do they represent? Cupping his two hands behind his ears, Ogotemmêli explained that the spirit had no external ears but only auditory holes. 'His hands serve for ears,' he said; 'to enable him to hear he always holds them on each side of his head. To tap the drum is to tap the Nummo's palms, to tap, that is, his ears.' Holding before him the web of threads which represented a weft, the Spirit with his tongue interlaced them with a kind of endless chain made of a thin strip of copper. He coiled this in a spiral of eighty turns, and throughout the process he spoke as he had done when teaching the art of weaving. But what he said was new. It was the third Word, which he was revealing to men ... As I understand him there are double loops of strings, 40 in all, a number which could be connected with those 80 nights before March 22. However, the kaikai figure formed is 4 times 8 and perhaps correlates with 'time gaps' in the glyph sequences, e.g.:
Instead of my idea of 10 connected with the difference between 364 and 354: ... I guess there has to be 10 pillars on top of each other because 12 lunar months is not enough for a 'star year', 364 = 12 * 29½ + 10 ... there once might have been a greater gap, 80 nights long, for instance from "October 31 (304) to 384 (= 13 * 29½ + ½). Each 'pillar' could have been 8 long. ... The trunk is then uprooted and split into faggots which are added to the flames. The twelve merry-men rush in a wild figure-of-eight dance around the fires, singing ecstatically and tearing at the flesh with their teeth. The bloody remains are burnt in the fire, all except the genitals and the head. These are put into an alder-wood boat and floated down the river to an islet; though the head is sometimes cured with smoke and preserved for oracular use. His tanist succeeds him and reigns for the remainder of the year, when he is sacrificially killed by a new Hercules ... (Cfr at Kai Viri.) Anyhow, creation evidently occurs between the regular calendar periods, between the 'shells' of the 'clam' or 'turtle': ... After the great flood had at long last receded, Raven had gorged himself on the delicacies left by the receding water, so for once, perhaps the first time in his life, he wasn't hungry. But his other appetites, his curiosity and the unquenchable itch to meddle and provoke things, to play tricks on the world and its creatures, these remained unsatisfied. Raven gazed up and down the beach. It was pretty, but lifeless. There was no one about to upset, or play tricks upon. Raven sighed. He crossed his wings behind him and strutted up and down the sand, his shiny head cocked, his sharp eyes and ears alert for any unusual sight or sound. The mountains and the sea, the sky now ablaze with the sun by day and the moon and stars he had placed there, it was all pretty, but lifeless. Finally Raven cried out to the empty sky with a loud exasperated cry. And before the echoes of his cry faded from the shore, he heard a muffled squeak. He looked up and down the beach for its source and saw nothing. He strutted back and and forth, once, twice, three times and still saw nothing. Then he spied a flash of white in the sand. There, half buried in the sand was a giant clamshell. As his shadow fell upon it, he heard another muffled squeak. Peering down into the opening between the halves of the shell, he saw it was full of tiny creatures, cowering in fear at his shadow ... (Cfr at Raven.)
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
