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TRANSLATIONS
Viri glyphs which are not turned sideways, as in L1-22 and Eb6-24 (note 6 and 24)
always (or nearly so) have their 'knee' pointing towards right. I guess that is because at spring equinox the 'elbow' is the elbow of the left arm, i.e. it points towards left. We can recollect: ... The idea of GD49 (huega)
showing a thigh made me reconsider (once again) and see this structure:
The 4 'pillars' (Aa1-5--8) holding the sky up depict stylized arms (GD32, toko te ragi) and the 'elbow' is at left (at the back side of the glyphs). In Aa1-9--10 we can probably see the 'persons' standing on a 'leg' with 'knee' towards right (at the front side of the glyphs). There is a shift from arm with elbow on the back side of the glyphs to leg with knee on the front side of the glyphs. Such a shift in position suggests that between Aa1-8 and Aa1-9 a turnaround is located ... ... The idea of joints ('elbows' and 'knees') being pictured pointing towards left to indicate the first half of a period and joints pointing towards right to indicate the second half agrees well with what we saw in Ea7-7--22:
Probably the sickles of waxing and waning moon have determined which way the joints should point - south of the equator waxing moon looks like this:
... GD32 also appears in Ab6-42--57 (16 glyphs), probably a 'calendar for the week':
The second half of the week has the hakaturu variant of GD32, marking a reversal compared to the first half of the week (and similar to the hakaturu glyphs at noon in the day calendars). Mars (Tuesday) and Venus (Friday) have two 'faces'; 'weak' and 'strong' light in the case of Mars, 'morning' and 'evening' star in the case of Venus. Mercury (Wednesday) is qualified with a glyph showing GD33 (viri), a sign probably meaning 'solstice'. Saturn has two glyphs showing 'elbows' pointing at right - which sign, we have learnt, probably indicates the 2nd 'season'. The open hand is similar to what we can see in the afternoon (in the day calendars) just before the sun 'dies'. Jupiter (Thursday) and Venus (Friday) have glyphs indicating hua, an appropriate sign for the 2nd 'season' ('autumn') ... ... During his descent the ancestor still possessed the quality of a water spirit, and his body, though preserving its human appearance, owing to its being that of a regenerated man, was equipped with four flexible limbs like serpents after the pattern of the arms of the Great Nummo. The ground was rapidly approaching. The ancestor was still standing, his arms in front of him and the hammer and anvil hanging across his limbs. The shock of his final impact on the earth when he came to the end of the rainbow, scattered in a cloud of dust the animals, vegetables and men disposed on the steps. It was an old Maori belief that a change of seasons was often facilitated by earthquakes. Ruau-moko, a god of the Underworld, was said to bring about changes of season, punctuating them with an earthquake. Or as another Maori saying summed up the matter, 'It is the Earth-mother shaking her breasts, and a sign of the change of season.' When calm was restored, the smith was still on the roof, standing erect facing towards the north, his tools still in the same position. But in the shock of landing the hammer and the anvil had broken his arms and legs at the level of elbows and knees, which he did not have before. He thus acquired the joints proper to the new human form, which was to spread over the earth and to devote itself to toil ... ... The two currents, Yang and Yin, in the earth's surface, were identified with the two symbols which apply to the eastern and western quarters of the sky, the Green Dragon ... of spring in the former case, the White Tiger ... of the autumn in the latter. Each of these would be symbolised by configurations of the ground. The former ought always to be to the left, and the latter to the right, of any tomb or habitation, which should preferably be protected by them, as if in the crook of an elbow ... ... When the baby is born a golden plover flies over and alights upon the reef. (Kua fanau lā te pepe kae lele mai te tuli oi tū mai i te papa). And so the woman thus names various parts of the child beginning with the name 'the plover' (tuli): neck (tuliulu), elbow (tulilima), knee (tulivae) ... ... The locations ulu, lima, vae (neck, elbow, knee according to the translators) on the body of the child makes me immediately refer to the locations in time (or in the sky) of the sun during its voyage. The words rima and vae are frequent in Metoro's explanations and systematically appear at GD35 respectively GD29:
I have suggested that the joints in the limbs are symbolizing the 'female' locations of change in the routines. The joints are certainly made evident in GD35 and GD29 ... The general form is similar in an arm and a leg. The arm in GD35 (rima) has a joint pointing at left (meaning 'female'), while the leg in GD29 (va'e) has a joint pointing at right (meaning 'male'). (I.e., the arm is 'female', while the leg is 'male.) In GD33 (viri) the joint also points towards right and we therefore should think 'male'. Turi (the golden plover, the rain bird) maybe fundamentally refers to the knee, and the elbow then becomes turi-rima, the 'knee of the arm':
In the horizontal viri (if we read the signs correctly) the open side may be up (as in L1-22) or down (as in Eb6-24). I guess that open side up means 'moon', while open side down means 'sun'. In a preliminary attempt to understand GD112 I once wrote:
Full moon is equivalent in structural terms with summer solstice. At 'noon' we find Poike, the highest peak. In the center of L1-33 there is a peak too. If ordinary viri (GD33) has autumn equinox at its 'knee', then that point is a nadir of the sun, according to the agricultural year he is 'dying'. In Eb6-24 the horizontal and open downwards position of viri, in combination with the death eyes of Makemake may refer to the same point in time-space, though now winter solstice when one sun is stamped out and another one reborn, the time of Janus, takurua, i.e. nadir according to the astronomical calendar. I have earlier inferred that Aa1-1 and Aa5-17 may belong together like α and ω: ... Aa5-17 may contain the missing second part of the viri that is embedded in Aa1-1:
Aa5-17 is an aberrant form of GD26 with the 'head' as a separate part, the only such in Tahua (in the same way as Aa1-1 is an aberrant unique form of GD42). Furthermore, we recognize hakaturu, the point of turnaround, as Aa5-18 (no. 350 from Aa1-1):
Aa5-17 may tell us that the past midsummer season is in its phase of 'seating':
The top part (separately drawn) in Aa5-17 is a glyph type which I only lately have become aware of as being an entity distinguished from other curved glyph types. It does not belong to GD36 (haga), nor does it represent the moon (GD44, marama):
Question now arises: In which way is this new entity related to GD26 (tara) and GD43 (hoea)?
The tara glyphs of Tahua we have earlier tabulated:
If Aa5-17 marks midsummer and Ab1-72 the end of the 2nd half-year, then possibly Ab8-42 marks the beginning of 1st half-year? The glyph is red-marked ... Before moving on, I would like to show some information about clew which I found in Wikipedia:
A corner ('knee', turi) is the only place where there is freedom (chaos), the rest of the time man must 'devote himself to toil'. Although the clews are 'free' corners, they are anyhow attached to the rest.
"Clewlines (green) and buntlines (red) for a single sail. The sail here is semi-transparent; fainter lines are running behind it ... ... As the name suggests, clewlines are attached to the outer corners or clews of the sail. They lift more weight than the buntlines, and also have to pull against the sheets - although these will have been released there is still a certain amount of friction produced by the blocks and fairleads that they run through. For this reason the clewlines are usually fitted with blocks to increase the purchase. The clewlines are coloured green in the diagram, and run along the underneath of the yard from the outboard ends to the mast, and then down to the deck. Buntlines lift the middle portion of the sail; there will usually be four to eight buntlines across the foot of the sail. Traditionally they are secured to the sail with buntline hitches. Since buntlines only have to lift a section of canvas, they can be thinner than the clewlines and are not usually fitted with a purchase. A typical arrangement for the buntlines has them running through deadeyes on the yard, upwards to a block fixed to the shrouds a little higher up the mast, and then downwards against the inside of the ratlines to the deck. This provides a good lead but does create a minor obstacle to sailors moving out along the yards ..." (Wikipedia) The uninitiated notices how one definition is attatched to all the other definitions and how only by understanding it all it will be possible to understand the parts. I imagine that the clue we have reached in form of the clew (viri, GD33) leads to the 'deadeyes' himself, Makemake. "... A deadeye is an item used in the standing and running rigging of traditional sailing ships. It is a smallish round thick wooden disc with one or more holes through it, perpendicular to the plane of the disc ... Single deadeyes are used to guide and control a line and, particularly in older vessels, to change its direction ..." (Wikipedia) "clue ... later form of CLEW, now restricted mainly to the sense 'fact, etc., leading (through a difficulty) to a solution or discovery'." (English Etymology) Makemake, for instance as probably depicted in Eb6-24,
is a word which I interpret as close to mate-mate, i.e. 'death-death' - I have in my mind equalized 'k' and 't' (inspired by the Hawaiians). Though Churchill explains matemate as 'to have a slight illness, to suffer pain':
Makemake is also close to mata-mata, i.e. 'eye-eye' (or 'half-cooked'):
... Hamiora Pio once spoke as follows to the writer: 'Friend! Let me tell of the offspring of Tangaroa-akiukiu, whose two daughters were Hine-raumati (the Summer Maid - personified form of summer) and Hine-takurua (the Winter Maid - personification of winter), both of whom where taken to wife by the sun ...
... From the fragments we can reconstruct but little of the native mythology. Atea and Papa, the primary parents, have not been recorded. Tangaroa came to Easter Island in the form of a seal with a human face and voice. The seal was killed but, though baked for the necessary time in an earth oven, the seal refused to cook. Hence the people inferred that Tangaroa must have been a chief of power ... ... the individuals who are 'cooked' are those deeply involved in a physiological process: the newborn child, the woman who has just given birth, or the pubescent girl ... |
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