Fornander wrote that once people counted only to 4, and he tried to show how the Polynesian words for the numbers 1-4 are causally related to the names of these numbers in other languages remote in time and space. I am not convinced. I can accept a certain relevant conceptual similarity, but that does not necessarily imply a causal relationship. And his way of comparing words carries no great weight for me.

I feel, though, that his proposed basic structure of 4 reverberates also in the rongorongo texts. An obvious and valuable example is the structure of the text in G as interpreted by way of kuhane stations and multiples of 59 (= 2 * 29.5):

 

8 * 59 is twice 4 * 59, and the our own sign 8 consists of two cycles.

But we have 5 fingers, not 4. The thumb is qualitatively different, and it is dubious if it should be counted. Once they counted with numerical qualifiers, it must be said what things were counted. It is impossible to count fingers and include the thumb - it is different and the same qualifier cannot be used. I find it natural that once counting had to take a break beyond 4.

Some of the examples of Fornander:

 

I find Malagasy (Malgasse) interesting, so far away (Madagascar) yet with words closely resembling those of e.g. Rapanui. I consulted Wikipedia to see if they agree with Fornander:

 

The majority (redmarked) of the names are definitely Polynesian in character. Going to Sanskrit I find only number 3 plausibly connected with Polynesian. Though it could be just a coincidential similarity - or - my guess: an example of a word with global distribution, extremely ancient, and no indicator of a special relationship with Polynesian.

After having written so far, I discovered that Fornander presumably with Malgasse meant some other island than Madagascar: "... in Indonesia we find Malgasse ar-rivu, 1000 ..."

And the numerals are indeed not named exactly alike:

 

If counting went to 4, stopping when the strange thumb appeared, then what caused the name of 5 to be rima (possibly related to Malagasy dimy)? I have a suggestion, after a quick look in Ifrah. In later Egyptian times glyph play had evolved, and an example is given where the meaning is 5:

Twirling it around we maybe have the origin of Te Kioe Uri:

The picture is that of a star. But the stars (hetu'u) in rongorongo have 6 'flames':

A star and a sun were considered to be of the same quality - 'fire':

 

A sea urchin is hetuke, which I 'read' as hetu-ke, another (sort of) hetu. I guess the spines all around the central 'ball' makes it look like a star - a black star, therefore -ke.

My intuition is guiding me, and the location of Sirius (the star per se) is immediately beyond the first 4 (double-months):

 

We use an asterisk for date of birth (a 'morning star'), and Te Pou indicates the birth of the 2nd part of the cycle. I am hinting that rima (finger, 5) means 'fire'.

The end of the 2nd cycle (or rather birth of the 1st cycle) lies, in contrast, in the dark. In the beginning there was only darkness. Light arrived later.

Rima cannot initially have meant fingers, because there are no more than 4 such, the last one is a thumb (and I think we should consider the thumb-signs in rongorongo glyphs to mean 'asterisk' - the birth of 'fire').

I have now 'proved' that rima initially was not finger but 5, and 5 was the number of 'flames' of a star - not the number of fingers on a hand.

I do not propose, however, that the word rima once meant star, rather it meant 'fire', the causal fire which ignites the camp-fire (and other 'fires'). It is connected with the meaning of 'birth' because at the end of a cycle a new 'fire' needs to be ignited. New Zealand ringa is close to the meaning - a ring being a cycle. This is also - in addition to toru, three etc - a widely spread word I believe.

The 'ring' once was 5 (as in the number of days in a week). Between 4 and the next cycle there arrived an 'intercalated' (beyond comprehension, in the dark) additional 'thumb'. Either you regarded 4 as the cycle or you added the 'black' unit, either you meant the regular and ordered 4-cycle or included also the disorderly extra unit.

8, our sign, refers to a doublet of 4-cycles. Beyond comes the dark 9.

The hands in the rongorongo signs have not 4 but 3 (toru) fingers. In a way the structure is self-similar: the 4th quarter is (cfr the 4th quarter of the moon) a 'black' quarter (a 'black cloth' powerful enough to generate).

Here I should quote Fornander:

"Professor Buschmann ... considers the terms pitu, fitu, hiku, as of purely Polynesian origin, and home-made, so to say. He refers the first syllable to a weakening of the Polynesian pa, fa, ha, 'four', and the second syllable to a contraction of the Polynesian tolu, 'three', thus assuming that the whole word originally was fa-tolu, 4 + 3 = 7.

This ... is ingenious and plausible; the more so as it starts from a quaternary basis, and builds up the higher numbers on that. But, unfortunately for this hypothesis, there is no instance within the whole range of the Polynesian language, from Madagascar to Easter Island, of any dialectical forms in fa-tu, fe-tu, fa-tolu, or fi-tolu, or the same forms commencing with p or h, or with the initial h dropped, as often is the case among the Polynesian dialects.

Had the pitu, fitu, been of Polynesian origin, some signs of its gradual corruption from an original fa-tolu to the present pitu, fitu, hiku, itu, could not fail to be found in some one of so many widely scattered and long isolated dialects. Were the word of Polynesian formation, it must have been adopted as the numeral 'seven', and the corruption from fa-tolu to fitu taken place, while the Polynesians yet were a unit, a comparatively compact body, and before their dispersion ..."

I believe Professor Buschmann was correct, and - as Fornander says - it implies a very ancient origin of the 'addition'. Moreover, I believe the structure for 7 as being composed of two unequal parts (4 and 3) was understood late in time.

4, as in the four corners of the earth (or as the four sides of a field) was a female number. Adding 3 (the sky) - a male number - and 7 (the moon) becomes the result. Moon is the giver of time and time is no more than the evolution of changes, a female trait.

"The Hawaiian day was divided in three general parts, like that of the early Greeks and Latins, - morning, noon, and afternoon - Kakahi-aka, breaking the shadows, scil. of night; Awakea, for Ao-akea, the plain full day; and Auina-la, the decline of the day.

The lapse of the night, however, was noted by five stations, if I may say so, and four intervals of time, viz.: (1.) Kihi, at 6 P.M., or about sunset; (2.) Pili, between sunset and midnight; (3) Kau, indicating midnight; (4.) Pilipuka, between midnight and surise, or about 3 A.M.; (5.) Kihipuka, corresponding to sunrise, or about 6 A.M. ..." (Fornander)

 Time consisted of night + day = 4 + 3 = 7:

 

Fornander is not clear as to how the night was structured, but 4 intervals of time it was. I have put midnight in a special (black) box because it represents the 'new fire' (the 'thumb', the '5th station'). The division (cut) of the time at midnight makes it natural to have a balance between 2 intervals before and 2 intervals after. There is no similar cut at noon. Time begins anew (with a new cycle) at the darkest place. Pilipuka becomes number 1 and Pili number 7. (Seven Macaw ought to be located just before 'midnight', and we can begin to understand such strange names as One and Seven Death.)

The order of diurnal time should have generated the names of the ordinal numbers from 1 to 7, I think.

In rongorongo we can probably use the 4 + 3 structure to interpret, e.g. the 'feathers' adorning the top of Te Pou:

 

4 at left (past) is followd by 3 at right (future).

The meanings and origins of words is much more difficult to explain than Fornander seems to think. We must avoid leaning on such 'facts', they can only be used for additional confirmation or as stimulating further investigations.

"10. The Polynesian 'ten', pulu, fulu, huru, with varying prefixes of sa, se, san, sanga, singa, tanga, aua, ono, honga, is doubtless a genuine Polynesian word. Its literal and archaic meaning in all the dialects is that of 'feathers, hair, wool'.

When the denary system was adopted, 'ten' became a new tally, and was expressed by a word indicating a multitude, as may be seen from its synonym umi lit., 'the beard' ..." (Fornander)

The 'feathers' of Te Pou therefore indirectly indicate a multitude, making light (the brightest star in the sky) into a source of growth.

Stars and the sun share this characteristic - they are sources of light and sources of growth.

Hetu'u is the word Fornander cannot see.

... But, unfortunately for this hypothesis, there is no instance within the whole range of the Polynesian language, from Madagascar to Easter Island, of any dialectical forms in fa-tu, fe-tu, fa-tolu, or fi-tolu, or the same forms commencing with p or h, or with the initial h dropped, as often is the case among the Polynesian dialects ...

 

The star (Tahitian fetu) could very well be the missing link between fa-tolu, 4 + 3 = 7, and hitu (7). Furthermore, pito (navel etc) is equally the missing link, because at 'midnight' the new day is born.

And hatu could be the word play induced 4:

 

The Hawaiian Pohaku, which otherwise would have been mysterious, becomes fully understood, Po-haku means the 'earth cycle' completed in the night (po). I.e. the night completed (hatu) - at dawn - is a 'stone', serving as a mark of time. We remember how Tuu Ko Ihu sat on the stone underneath which he had buried the skull of Hotu Matua, it was a marker of time, of who was in charge, what season was ruling.