⁸ See F. X. Kugler, S. J., Ergänzungsheft zum 1. u. 2. Buch (1935), pp. 55f.; P. F. Gössmann, Planetarium Babylonicum: 'The star at the beam of the wagon is the fox star: Era, the powerful among the gods. In astrological usage, it represents above all the planet Mars/Nergal.' See also E. F. Weidner, Handbuch Babyl. Astr. (1915), p. 141; E. Burrows. S. J., 'The Constellatoion of the Wagon and Recent Archaeology', in Festschrift Deimel (1935), pp. 34, 36. The said Nergal, i.e. Mars, to whom 'belongs' Alcor in the Series ^mulAPIN, starts the first flood, as we learn from Utnapishtim ... under the name of Era, he succeeds in starting a new one, according to the Era-Epos.

The same star crosses our way again in the Scholia to Aratus⁹

⁶ ... E. Maass. Commentariorum in Aratum Reliquae (1898), p. 391, ll. 3ff.

where we are told that it is Electra, mother of Dardanus, who left her station among the Pleiades, desperate because of Ilion's fall, and retired 'above the second star of the beam ... others call this star fox'.

This small piece of evidence may show the reader two things: (1) that the Fall of Troy meant the end of a veritable world-age. (For the time being, we assume that the end of the Pleiadic age is meant; among various reasons, because Dardanos came to Troy after the third flood, according to Nonnos.); (2) that Ursa Major and the Pleiades figuring on the shield of Achilles, destroyer of Troy, have a precise significance, and are not to be taken as testimony for the stupendous ignorance of Homer who knew none but these constellations, as the specialists want us to believe. There are indeed, too many traditions connecting Ursa and the Pleiades with this or that kind of catastrophe to be overlooked. Among the many we mention only one example from later Jewish legends, some lines taken out of a most fanciful description of Noah's flood, quoted by Frazer:¹⁰

⁶ Folk-Lore in the Old Testament (1918), vol. I, pp. 143f.

Now the deluge was caused by the male waters from the sky meeting the female waters which issued forth from the ground. The holes in the sky by which the upper waters escaped were made by God when he removed stars out of the constellation of the Pleiades; and in order to stop this torrent of rain, God had afterwards to bung up the two holes with a couple of stars borrowed from the constellation of the Bear. That is why the Bear runs after the Pleiades to this day; she wants her children back, but she will never get them till after the Last Day."

(Hamlet's Mill)

I note the two holes in the Pleiades and remember that once these stars were one only.

The connection between the Pleiades and Ursa Major is - I believe - because they both are 'cardinal' in their character, they mark time like heart-beats. The orientation of Ursa Major tells us what time it is (given the time of the year of course) and the location of the Pleiades in the sky likewise tells us the time of the night.

The 'planets' too give us time. Saturn meets Jupiter every 20 years to tell him the time, the phases of the Moon tell us how many nights have passed of the month and Sun gives us not only the year but also the time of the day. In the calendar of the week the 'splendid bird' might therefore very well mean 'time giver'; GD11 appears at sun, at moon, at Jupiter, and at Saturn. Shouldn't we search for GD11 in the Matariki calendar too?

If moai at Ahu Akivi come alive to tell us that we have arrived at equinox, then of course they must be 7. And as the Matariki no longer marks equinox, they of course cannot be 7. For the time of solstice 6 is more appropriate.