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2. The name of the first part of this Outline Dictionary of Rongorongo Signs was chosen to be Dream Voyager in order to allude to the first part of Manuscript E, in which the dream soul of Hau Maka (sleeping in the Old Homeland) went flying across the sea in search for Easter Island (cfr Te Kuhane o Hau Maka). The mode of Dream Voyager is the same, a flight in the dark above unknown territories, faintly perceived as in a dream and with seemingly irrational ideas hardly acceptable for the critical mind of the daylight. It was necessary, I thought, to give at least some 'back-ground' before 'facing' a more serious approach. Evolution began in the dark and so must we.
Next part then naturally became Dawn Breaker, because it was to be a kind of breakthrough, a parting of the curtains of night in order to walk on firm ground. The task had been given, viz. to put in parallel prominent stars in the sky with the glyphs in the G text. I had discovered a probable relationship between each glyph and a day, initially from a guess it was Antares (α Scorpio) which was depicted in Ga7-16. This guess changed into a hypothesis when I found another glyph of similar kind 181 glyphs earlier - it could be Aldebaran (α Tauri) which is rising 181 days earlier than Antares:
The cycle of the year (24 right ascension hours) will then be shorter than the length of the G text. The hypothesis of a correspondence between number of glyphs and days could therefore imply that the parallel did not necessarily stretch outside the domain defined by Aldebaran and Antares. Possibly there were 2 glyphs for each day beyond 6 lunar months, because 6 * 29½ = 236 and 236 + 236 / 2 = 472. Extending the idea of 1 glyph per day backwards in time revealed it probably was correct, for instance by comparing the glyphs corresponding to the Pole Star (and an accumulation of other prominent stars) with the glyphs around vaha mea at Aldebaran:
The position of a star in the text is presumably defined not by a single glyph but by a triplet of glyps, because there must be borderline cases where it is difficult to know if a star is at the end of a day or if it is at the beginning of next day (e.g. is Polaris close to day 435 and Sheratan close to day 437). A pair of glyphs is necessary. But with a pair of glyphs for each star there are still borderline cases, viz. those where a star was measured to be e.g. in position 436.0 - should it pair up with Gb7-24 or with Gb7-26? Only with a triplet of glyphs for each star can an orderly system be possible. |
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