TRANSLATIONS

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Of course I am also biased because of imagined similarities with the English (and Swedish) languages. A hook seems to be the right word to translate the haga rave glyph type with - judging solely on its appearance:

hook?

However, haga (bay etc) means rather the opposite of hook:

hook ... corner, angle, point of land ... (English Etymology)

A hook is male, while haga is female - the same phenomenon looked at from different 'angles'. With that in mind, 'sinking to the bottom' (hukihuki) conjoined with Metoro's hokohuki evokes an image of the long 'tree' of midsummer (the 'digging stick', huki) 'going to the bottom' (hukihuki, transpierce):

Huki

1. Pole attached to the poop from which the fishing-net is suspended: huki kupega. 2. Digging stick. 3. To set vertically, to stand (vt.). 4. Huki á te mahina, said of the new moon when both its horns have become visible. Vanaga.

1. To post up, to publish. 2. To cut the throat (uki). Mq.: Small sticks which close up the ridge of a house. Ha.: hui, the small uniting sticks in a thatched house.  Churchill.

Standing upright. Barthel.

M. Spit for roasting. Te Huki, a constellation. Makemson.

Hukihuki. 1. Colic. 2. To transpierce, a pricking. 3. To sink to the bottom. Churchill.

Let us move on:

4. The word 'daybreak' apparently is picture language for daylight winning over (breaking the power of) the night. We can see this happen every morning.

When night is 'falling' it is picture language for the 'black cloth' of darkness falling over us. In autumn the same concept is expressed by 'fall'.

Already beyond noon (respectively midsummer), however, the moai (bending over) is beginning. When we say 'nightfall' the Polynesians would rather express it as 'sun is falling on his face' ('dying' at the horizon in the west).

On Easter Island cardinal points for the sun are located in the east, 'birth', and in the north sun is fully grown and standing high, tagata:

At the horizon in the west 'death' is located and in the south is 'the land of the spirits'. Sun moves counterclockwise south of the equator.

Each cardinal point could perhaps be regarded as a bay (haga) for the sun 'canoe' sailing across the sky. The explorers, lead by Ira, stayed and rested at both Haga Takaúre and Haga Hônu.

Possibly, therefore, the rongorongo calendars are using haga rave glyphs to mark cardinal points.

Several ideas come to mind. The Maya indians thought of 'north' as 'up' (and therefore, of course, of 'south' as down). In Mayan mind 'north' ('up') was also the place where Itzam Yeh sat in the top of the Milky Way. The king impersonated the ceiba tree (the Milky Way, the Tree of Life) and had the bird on top of his head:

On Easter Island the light (life) was in the north. South was 'winter', the dark season, toga. If tagata is a picture of 'life at noon', then the top of tagata ought to be up in the 'noon sky' (with the feet down on the ground). Such a tagata must stand on dry land, not in the water.

North of the equator the high latitudes were thought of as high up in the cold 'dark mountain of the earth', an idea encompassing both space and time (winter).

North of the equator the far south was anciently thought of as only water. Land in the north, water in the south. High in the north, low in the south.

If people on Easter Island were acutely aware of their low latitude, which they probably were, they would tend to look northwards and have their backs turned towards the awful south. The Emperor of China had his back towards the north. The face should be towards the sun.

'Up' was not towards the south but towards the east. People inhabiting the coastal areas of South America also thought of east as up - certainly influenced by the Andes. Polynesians in general thought of east as 'up' because it was heavy going sailing towards the prevalining winds and ocean currents moving towards the west. Even the sky moved in that direction. Finally, on Easter Island the highest ground was in the east, Poike.

Sun came from east, from 'up' (from the sky, ragi) and travelled 'down' towards his end in the west. Tagata therefore cannot mean 'maximum height' but rather indicates the position overhead (the chief position).

The tagata glyph type ought to be thought of as the view with south in the back. The south must then be a watery region, i.e. the same concept of south as north of the equator.

In Saturday pau is illustrated with the left (past) foot being swollen:

Hb9-51 Hb9-52 Hb9-53 Hb9-54 Hb9-55 Hb9-56 Hb9-57 Hb9-58

In Hb9-53 the future foot is held out as if in a running posture, toes flowing as if visualizing the time of light ahead. The swollen foot in Hb9-52 ought to illustrate the 'fist' of the foot, a pregnant foot with no light ready to leave as yet.

The rongorongo directions are in time, not in space. Time is the dimension of the moon. Left and right in the flow of glyphs are therefore defined by the moon, she dictates the calendars.

Sun must take the opposite (complementary) dimension, i.e. space. The rongorongo directions up and down in the glyphs represent space.

The head of tagata is high up, his feet is low, standing on dry land. Let us look again on the summary page of tagata:

 
Summary: The plain (without extra signs) tagata glyphs symbolize the apex (fully grown) 'person' - not an unitiated youth and not an old man but a warrior in full strength. As such tagata was used at noon and in the middle of summer.
 
A fully grown season (tagata) which is located elsewhere than at 'zenith' (noon or midsummer) was adorned with one or several signs to identify what season was meant.
 
Ha6-2 Ga4-1 Eb3-1 Eb5-4
noon midsummer winter (from autumn to spring equinox) summer (from spring to autumn equinox)
 
The examples of texts with winter and summer tagata glyphs prove that with extra signs present we cannot expect the reading to be 'center' or 'zenith'.

If tagata is thought of as marking noon or midsummer the path of thought should have gone from his high birth in the east to his overhead position in the north.

Eb3-1 and Eb5-4 have signs for the future (right from us seen), as if the path of thought had gone back from the future to the 'zenith' position right in front of us when reading.