|
TRANSLATIONS
Writing about GD13 (rei miro) in the glyph
dictionary forced me into new thoughts and lead to some
valuable insights worth following up further ahead. This
is what I wrote:
|
General introduction:
1.
A rei
miro pectoral could be
designed in several different ways, for
example (Heyerdahl 3):
Though often left-right
symmetric, asymmetric examples also exist
(ref. Heyerdahl 3):
This example furthermore
proves that a fish in some way could be
equal to the more often found 'ship with two
figureheads'. |
|
2.
Both rei miro examples
have what presumably is meant to indicate a
moon sickle
incised in their centers. Moon has two
sickles - waxing and waning - oppositely
oriented (as the figureheads in the first
example).
Anciently moon was connected with fishes,
sometimes even regarded as a kind of fish.
During the days we see the golden sun 'fly'
above like a glorious bird, during nights we
can see moon swim above like a silvery fish:
... Now birds and fishes are born under the
sign of the
Yin,
but they belong to the
Yang.
This is why birds and fishes both lay eggs.
Fishes swim in the waters, birds fly among
the clouds. But in winter, the swallows and
starlings go down into the sea and change
into mussels ... (Ta Tai Li Chi
according to Needham II)
|
'The strongly curved fish on the
chest of the central
Tiahuanaco deity is carved
in the form of a moonshaped
pectoral ...'
From Posnansky I have copied
pictures of the Gateway of the
Sun and then enlarged the
mentioned pectoral:
'... The prominent place of this
crescentic pectoral worn by the
supreme [sun] deity is
remarkable when we recall that a
moon-shaped pectoral was the
specific royal emblem worn by
the Easter Island kings of
allegedly divine descent, who
directed all rongo-rongo
ceremonies. These crescentic
royal pectorals are also among
the commonly occurring glyphs in
the rongo-rongo script.
On the Tiahuanaco deity,
the crescentic pectoral in the
shape of a fish is generally
considered to symbolize his
power over the sea and water,
just as the feathers and condor
heads show his power over the
sky and air.
That the crescentic pectoral of
the Easter Island kings have a
similar symbolic value seems
clearly indicated by the early
claim that it represented the
ancestral type of boat (Jaussen,
1893, p. 9). ...' (Heyerdahl 4) |
|
|
3.
The boat
form -
which is seen on most rei miro
pectorals - alludes to another idea, that
sun and moon are like ships sailing upon the
celestial waters.
The sky is blue like the sea and at the
distant horizon it can be difficult to
distinguish where the sea ends and the sky
begins.
4. A boat has two ends,
inseparable
as the phases of the moon. The moon sickles
are like rei mua (the figurehead at
the bow) and rei muri (the figurehead
at the stern).
The two oppositely oriented moon sickles
can be imagined as two differently oriented
fishes, yet being one:
|
At left the '... ING rune, used
by the Ingveons, the Cimbrians
and the Teutons, which clearly
shows how the waxing and waning
moon sickles are joined ...'
The two fishes in the middle is
a visual representation from the
Chimu Indians and at right we
have a sign for Pisces. (Ref.
Zehren) |
|
|
A few technical notes:
5.
The glyph type GD13
(named rei miro by me due to the
usage of Metoro) differs on several points
from the wooden rei miro
pectorals. First we notice the
orientation:
GD13 glyphs are raised upright as if
they were standing on their (front) ends
- not at all looking as if they were
sailing on the sea.
Possibly the vertical
orientation is partly due to a wish to
save horizontal space for the glyphs in
the lines of the rongorongo
board. Wood was scarce on Easter Island
and thoughts of economy may have
influenced:
|
...The stone masons who
went ashore and began to cut
and join enormous blocks of
basalt had not reached a
barren and grass-covered
island where they could drag
their enormous monoliths
about the plains at will;
rather, they first had to
cut down trees and clear
land to get access to
quarries, and to allow
freedom of movement for
themselves and their
monuments ... (Heyerdahl 2)
... I can see no reason why
not man and his animals
could have succeeded to
exterminate practically
everything of original
nature except the lichens
and mosses covering the
rocks and a few herbs and
grasses ... (Skottsberg
according to Heyerdahl 4)
... The toromiro wood
was formerly the principal
and indispensable material
for Easter Island wood
carving. Due to the general
barrenness of the land at
the time of the European
arrival, every scrap of
drift wood was collected
too, but whenever
toromiro was available
it was preferred for all
wooden artifacts, from
personal ornaments and
images to house frames,
canoes and paddles.
The demand for this wood
among the natives was so
great that the forests in
more recent generations have
been rapidly vanishing, and
partly substituted by the
imported miro tahiti...
Some of the keenest local
wood carvers had old chunks
of toromiro wood
hoarded in their personal
hiding-places, and a fair
size root was brought from a
cave and presented to the
writer as a treasure ...
(Heyerdahl 4) |
|
In
Rb3-103 we have a rare
example of a glyph where
GD13 is horizontally
oriented:
The
bottom part of the glyph
is GD63 (ariki)
and the head of the
ariki (king) has
taken the form of a
rei miro glyph.
Otherwise
the GD13 glyphs as a
rule are oriented
vertically with the
'inside of the ship' at
right. |
|
|
6.
Next we notice how there
are two
appendices hanging down
from the 'hull' of the 'ship':
They do not depict the 'fins' of
a 'fish-ship'. Neither do they
represent some kind of paddles for
conveying the canoe forward. Instead
they are meant as a visual cue for
the sickles of the moon. One
appendice is oriented forward at the
bow and the other backwards at the
stern.
|
South of
the equator the waxing
moon phase has a form
similar to C, a form
which we who live north
of the equator has
learnt means waning
moon.
The
front 'fin' of rei
miro glyphs,
therefore, suggests
waxing moon and the
'fin' at the
stern of the 'ship'
the waning moon. |
Only seldom do we
find GD13 glyphs without the
appendages, and if so the
orientation of the glyph is
reversed, a kind of signal meaning
the opposite of the normal
interpretation of rei miro
glyphs.
|
In
Da1-111 we have a rei
miro glyph without
appendages, immediately
thereafter followed by a
normal glyph:
 
The left
of the pair corresponds
in its form to the
waning phase of the moon
(as seen from the
latitude of Easter
Island).
In Hb5-44
a reversed horizontal
rei miro probably is
depicted, compare with
Rb3-103:
Without
the appendages there is
a lack of force. The
missing head and the arm
at right - drawn without
hand - are signs
conveying the same
message. |
|
| "It is an
interesting fact, although one
little commented upon, that
myths involving a canoe journey,
whether they originate from the
Athapaskan and north-western
Salish, the Iroquois and
north-eastern Algonquin, or the
Amazonian tribes, are very
explicit about the respective
places allocated to passengers.
In the case of
maritime, lake-dwelling or
river-dwelling tribes, the fact
can be explained, in the first
instance, by the importance they
attach to anything connected
with navigation:
'Literally and
symbolically,' notes Goldman ...
referring to the Cubeo of
the Uaupés basin, 'the
river is a binding thread for
the people. It is a source of
emergence and the path along
which the ancestors had
travelled. It contains in its
place names genealogical as well
as mythological references, the
latter at the petroglyphs in
particular.'
A little
further on ... the same observer
adds: 'The most important
position in the canoe are those
of stroke and steersman. A woman
travelling with men always
steers, because that is the
lighter work. She may even nurse
her child while steering ... On
a long journey the prowsman or
stroke is always the strongest
man, while a woman, or the
weakest or oldest man is at the
helm ..." (Origin of Table
Manners) |
|
7.
The 'hull' of the
GD13 'ship' is slim, usually
not having the rather fat
middle of the rei miro
pectorals.
In the middle of the two
wooden pectorals (we have
seen) is incised a single
thin sickle. However, the
rongorongo writing
system prescribes that in
principle only
contours should
be drawn. Therefore the kind
of moon sickle seen incised
on the wooden pectorals
cannot be incised inside the
'hull' of GD13 glyphs. On
GD13 glyphs the sign of the
moon is instead conveyed by
the two appendages hanging
down from the 'hull'.
The thin moon
sickles on the rei miro
pectorals perhaps explain
why the 'hull' of GD13
glyphs (nearly always) are
slim.
|
In Large
Santiago Tablet
the creator has,
though, rei
miro glyphs
with thick
middles, e.g.
Ga2-27:
 |
|
In the
last
(24th) of the glyph sequences in a
Keiti
calendar we find two rei miro
glyphs:
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
Eb5-29 |
Eb5-30 |
Eb5-31 |
Eb5-32 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
Eb5-33 |
Eb5-34 |
Eb5-35 |
Eb6-1 |
 |
 |
 |
|
Eb6-2 |
Eb6-3 |
Eb6-4 |
|
The 24 sequences in the calendar all end in
a similar way:
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
7 |
8 |
9 |
10 |
11 |
12 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
13 |
14 |
15 |
16 |
17 |
18 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
19 |
20 |
21 |
22 |
23 |
24 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
|
Eb3-4 is located in the 5th
period. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
7 |
8 |
9 |
10 |
11 |
12 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
13 |
14 |
15 |
16 |
17 |
18 |
|
After the 16th period a change
occurs in how the mouth is
drawn. The body is closer to
henua (GD37). Eb5-7 is
located in the 18th period. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
19 |
20 |
21 |
22 |
23 |
24 |
|
With
red
is marked the summer season (12
periods), with
black
the winter season (also 12
periods). |
|
|
7 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
Eb3-20 |
Eb3-21 |
Eb3-22 |
Eb3-23 |
Eb3-24 |
Eb3-25 |
|
24 |
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
Eb6-4 |
Eb6-5 |
Eb6-6 |
Eb6-7 |
Eb6-8 |
Eb6-9 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
Eb6-10 |
Eb6-11 |
Eb6-12 |
Eb6-13 |
Eb6-14 |
Eb6-15 |
 |
 |
 |
|
16 glyphs |
|
Eb6-16 |
Eb6-17 |
Eb6-18 |
Eb6-19 |
|
|
Having established that in a calendar for
the year (or rather in a calendar covering
summer + winter) rei miro glyphs were
used in connection with the cardinal points (solstices,
equinoxes), it is time to once again take up
the question about what meaning GD13 glyphs
have.
The four seasons defined by the cardinal
points (or for that matter the divisions of
the day) is not a state of nature which
'primitive' man accepted without deep
thinking.
In South America, for example, there were
myths which referred to the beginning as
either a time when there was constant
darkness or when there was constant light,
and how it came about that this still world
started to move around as we can observe it
today.
Other myths described how the seasons were
moving too slowly or running to fast, as
when Maui had to
slow the sun down in order to give his
wife enough time to cook their meals. |
|
"HOW MAUI MADE THE SUN SLOW DOWN
One day Maui said to his wife: 'Light
a fire and cook some food for me'. She did
so, but no sooner had she heated her cooking
stones in the earth-oven than the sun went
down, and they had to eat their food in the
dark. This set Maui to thinking how
the days might be made longer. It was his
opinion that they were shorter than they
needed to be, and that the sun crossed the
sky too quickly. So he said to his brothers:
'Let us catch the sun in a noose and make
him move more slowly. Then everybody would
have long days in which to get their food
and do all the things that have to be done.'
His brothers said it was impossible. 'No man
can go near the sun', they said. 'It is far
too hot and fierce.' Maui answered:
'Have you not seen all the things I have
done already? You have seen me change myself
into all the birds of the forest, and back
again into a man as I am now. I did that by
enchantments, and without even the help of
the jawbone of my great ancestress, which I
now have. Do you really suppose that I could
not do what I suggest?'
The brothers were persuaded by these
arguments, and agreed to help him. So they
all went out collecting flax, and brought it
home, and sat there twisting it and plaiting
it. And this was when the methods were
invented of plaiting flax into tuamaka,
or stout, square-shaped ropes, and
paharahara, or flat ropes; and the
method of twisting the fibre into round
ropes. When they had made all the ropes they
needed, Maui took up the jawbone of
Muri ranga whenua, and away they
went, carrying their provisions with them,
and the ropes.
They travelled all that night, having set
out at evening lest the sun should see them.
When the first light of dawn appeared, they
halted and hid themselves so that the sun
should not see them. At night they resumed
their journey, and at dawn they hid
themselves again, and in this way,
travelling only when the sun could not
observe them, they went far away to the
eastward, until they came to the edge of the
pit from which the sun rises.
On each side of this place they built a long
high wall of clay, with huts made of
branches at either end to hide in. There
were four huts, one for each of the
brothers. When all was ready they set their
noose and saw that it was as strong as they
could make it. The brothers lay waiting in
the huts, and Maui lay hiding in the
darkness behind the wall on the western side
of the place where the sun rises. He held in
his hand the jawbone of his ancestress, and
now he gave his brothers their final
instructions:
'Mind you keep hidden', he said. 'Don't go
letting him see you or you'll frighten him
off. Wait until his head and his shoulders
are through the noose. Then when I shout,
pull hard, and haul on the ropes as fast as
you can. I will go out and knock him on the
head, but do not any of you let go your
ropes until I tell you. When he's nearly
dead we'll let him loose. Whatever you do,
don't be silly and feel sorry for him when
he screams. Keep the ropes good and tight
until I say.'
And so they waited there in the darkness at
the place where the sun rises. At length the
day dawned, a chilly grey at first, then
flaming red. And the sun came up from his
pit, suspecting nothing. His fire spread
over the mountains, and the sea was all
glittering. He was there, the great sun
himself, to be seen by the brothers more
closely than any man had ever seen him. He
rose out of the pit until his head was
through the noose, and then his shoulders.
Then Maui shouted, and the ropes were
pulled, the noose ran taut. The huge and
flaming creature struggled and threshed, and
leapt this way and that, and the noose
jerked up and down and back and forth; but
the more the captive struggled, the more
tightly it held.
Then out rushed Maui with his
enchanted weapon, and beat the sun about the
head, and beat his face most cruelly. The
sun screamed out, and groaned and shrieked,
and Maui struck him savage blows,
until the sun was begging him for mercy. The
brothers held the ropes tight, as they had
been told, and held on for a long time yet.
Then at last when Maui gave the
signal they let him go, and the ropes came
loose, and the sun crept slowly and feebly
on his course that day, and has done ever
since. Hence the days are longer than they
formerly were.
It was during this struggle with the sun
that his second name was learned by man. At
the height of his agony the sun cried out:
'Why am I treated by you in this way? Do you
know what it is you are doing. O you men?
Why do you wish to kill Tama nui te ra?'
This was his name, meaning Great Son of the
Day, which was never known before." (Maori
Myths)
There is another version of Maui
slowing down the sun in which the ropes are
burnt and cannot catch the sun:
"... he gathered all the coconut husks of
his land and rolled the fibre, and he
plaited it into ropes of very great
strength. But these ropes also were of no
use, for the sun-god made them frizzle up.
Therefore Maui took the sacred
tresses of his sister Hina, he cut
off lengths of Hina's hair and
plaited it, to make a rope whose mana
could not be destroyed by Ra. He took
that noose of Hina's hair, he
travelled eastward to the border of the sea;
he placed his ropes around the pit from
which the sun rises, waited there, he waited
for the dawn. Then Ra came up, he
came up from the spirit-world which lies in
the east.
Maui
pulled the cord, he caught the sun-god by
the throat! Ra struggled, kicked, he
screamed against the sky. 'Then will you go
more slowly if I turn you loose?' The sun
then promised Maui, 'Let me go, and I
will move more slowly, I will make longer
days for your fishing'. Since that time, men
have had longer days in which to go about
their work." (Legends of the South Seas) |
|
The slow and steady movement of the seasons
of today are truly remarkable and a proof of
cosmic order, a balanced wheel of slow
change. A symbol for this wonderful and
beneficient order is the canoe.
In a canoe there is order. The weak sit at
the stern, the strong at the bow. Nobody
stands up. There is only one captain.
Furthermore, the famous South American myth
about
Amalivaca breaking the legs of his
daughters in order to make them stay home -
as described and commented upon by
Lévi-Strauss - definitely connects the canoe
with the cosmic order. |
|
"M415.
Tamanac. 'The girls who were forced to
marry'
Amalivaca,
the ancestor of the Tamanac, arrived
at the time of the great deluge in which all
Indians, with the exception of one man and
one woman who hat taken refuge on the top of
a mountain, had been drowned.
While
travelling in his boat, the demiurge carved
the figures of the sun and moon on the
Painted Rock
of the Encaramada.
He had a
brother called Vochi.
Together they levelled the earth's surface.
But in spite of all their efforts, they were
unable to make the river Orinoco
run both ways.
Amalivaca
had daughters who were very fond of travel.
So he broke their legs in order to force
them to be sedentary and to populate the
land of the Tamanac
..."
|
"... the
resemblance between the
respective names between the
demiurges in M415
and M416,
in both of which they are
subjected to the ordeal of a
flood which destroys mankind and
then entrusted with the
reorganization of the world,
suggests that the two
symmetrical episodes of
theoriginal legless couple and
the demiurge's daughters with
broken legs should be treated as
inverted sequences.
Amalivaca
broke his daughters' legs in
order to prevent them travelling
hither and thither and to force
them to remain in one place, so
that their procreative powers,
which had no doubt been put to
wrong uses during their
adventurous wanderings, should
henceforth be confined to
increasing the Tamanac
population.
Conversely,
Mayowoca
bestows legs on a primeval and,
of necessity, sedentary couple,
so that they can both move about
freely and procreate.
In M415,
the sun and the moon are fixed
or, to be more exact, their
joint representation in the form
of rock carvings provides a
definitive gauge of the moderate
distance separating them and the
relative proximity uniting them.
But, since the rock is
motionless, the river below
should - supposing creation were
perfect - flow both ways, thus
equalizing the journeys upstream
and downstream.
Anyone who has travelled in a
canoe knows that a distance that
can be covered in a few hours
when the journey is downstream
may require several days if the
direction is reversed.
The river flowing
two ways corresponds then, in
spatial terms, to the search, in
temporal terms, for a correct
balance between the respective
durations of day and night ...
such a balance should also be
obtainable through the
appropriate distance between the
moon and the sun being measured
out in the form of rock carvings
..." (The Origin of Table
Manners) |
|
|
The cardinal points mark where the order is
broken (as the legs of the daughters of
Amalivaca). Disorder threatens and the
rei miro glyphs illustrate the wished
for new kind of stability:
We immediately recognize the symbol for
spring - a running man (Eb3-5) - the season
the preceding rei miro will secure.
In Eb5-8 the harvest season (autumn) is
illustrated by a fist like a fruit.
In Eb5-33 we have a kind of bird
representing the moon. Before the spring
season - in the dark first quarter - it is
the moon (not the sun) who rules.
As to Eb3-21 and Eb6-5 - at midwinter and midsummer the fate of the
next 'year' (period of 12 half-months) is
decided. |
The rei miro are rich symbols, we
have not yet by far exhausted the
associations. Fischer informs that it has
been suggested that the rei miro
wooden pendants may have originated when
Captain Cook visited the island in 1774:
|
... Throughout Polynesia, the
word rei signifies a neck
ornament of some kind, perhaps
internationally best known as
Hawaii's lei ('flower
necklace'). Easter Island's
rei miro ('wooden rei')
are without parallel in
Polynesia.
However, they display a form
that is strikingly similar to
the silver crescent gorget worn
by Cook's Marine Officer Gibson
who accompanied Cook on all
three voyages, including the one
to Rapa Nui in 1774. Such
silver crescent gorgets was
prescribed dress for a Marine
Officer of the British Royal
Navy in the second half of the
eighteenth century. Rapa Nui's
rei miro were attested only
after 1774 ... |
Clearly the Easter Islanders quickly must
have grasped the meaning of the silvery
crescent symbol worn by the
officer on duty: viz. to identify the man in
charge of responsibilities. The form of the
moon is the crescent and it is silvery.
However, the possibility must not be ruled
out that rei miro glyphs appeared
before the rei miro pendants. Fischer
has stated that Mamari was a tablet
certainly created before missionary times,
and in Mamari we find rei miro
glyphs. |
"... A
gorget
originally
was a steel
collar
designed to
protect the
throat. It
was a
feature of
older types
of armour
and intended
to protect
against
swords and
other
non-projectile
weapons.
Later,
particularly
from the
18th century
onwards, the
gorget
became
primarily
ornamental,
serving only
as a
symbolic
accessory on
military
uniforms.
Most
Medieval
versions of
gorgets were
simple neck
protectors
that were
worn under
the
breastplate
and
backplate
set. These
neck plates
supported
the weight
of the
armour worn
over it, and
many were
equipped
with straps
for
attaching
the heavier
armour
plates.
Later,
Renaissance
gorgets were
not worn
with a
breastplate
but instead
were worn
over the
clothing.
Most gorgets
of this
period were
beautifully
etched,
gilt,
engraved,
chased,
embossed, or
enamelled
and probably
very
expensive.
Gorgets were
the last
form of
armour worn
on the
battlefield.
During the
18th and
early 19th
centuries,
crescent-shaped
gorgets of
silver or
silver gilt
were worn by
officers in
most
European
armies, both
as a badge
of rank and
an
indication
that they
were on
duty. These
last
survivals of
armour were
much smaller
(usually
about three
to four
inches in
width) than
their
Medieval
predecessors
and were
suspended by
chains or
ribbons. In
the British
service they
carried the
Royal coat
of arms
until 1796
and
thereafter
the Royal
cypher.
Colonel
George
Washington
wore a
gorget as
part of his
uniform in
the French
and Indian
War, which
symbolized
his
commission
as an
officer in
the Virginia
Regiment.
Gorgets
ceased to be
worn by
British army
officers in
1830, and by
their French
counterparts
20 years
later ..."
(Wikipedia)
|
|
Rei miro glyphs
depict a canoe. At a
cardinal point the journey
of the (moon) canoe of the
sun takes on a new course -
the steering must always be
done in a straight
direction, otherwise your
are quickly lost.
In a way it is as if the new
season (direction of the
'canoe') is 'born' at the
time when the course is
changed. The sense of
'birth' therefore adheres to
rei miro glyphs. At
the beginning of the day,
for example, the sun is
'born' to travel in a
straight line upwards to
noon:
|
period 1 |
 |
 |
|
Aa1-18 |
Aa1-19 |
The arm upheld toward the
mouth in Aa1-18 is designed
to allude to a rei miro
canoe (we can see the
moon sickle signs). In the
first period of the day sun
is like a newborn baby. A
baby is in charge of the
first phase of the day.
This idea - of different
'persons' being in charge of
the periods which follow
upon each other in a
cyclical pattern - is very
ancient. It was for example
used to determine
the order of the days in the
week. |
|
"...the Chaldean astrologers introduced the
7-day week which has come down into the
present. The number was convenient because
the seers recognized seven planets: Saturn,
Jupiter, Mars, Sun, Venus, Mercury and the
Moon, each of which governed one hour of the
day.
If,
for illustration, Saturn ruled the first
hour of a certain day followed by each of
the 'planets' in turn, he also ruled the
eighth, fifteenth, and twenty-second hours.
Jupiter was lord of the second, ninth,
sixteenth, and twenty-third hours; Mars
presided over the third, tenth, seventeenth,
and twenty-fourth hours, and the Sun took
charge of the first hour of the succeeding
day.
Since the planet which ruled the first hour
gave his name to the entire day, Sunday thus
followed Saturn-day, and this was the way
the names of the days of the week came into
existence out of ancient Chaldean
astrology." Reference: Makemson |
I stopped here. But ideas remain. For example: Maybe
Hb9-58 illustrates the sun bird who appears next day.
I have written about the manu rere birds in
Thursday and Saturday by explaining them as other god
rulers than the sun (Jupiter respectively Saturn). No
longer am I convinced.
Possibly also the Thursday bird illustrates the sun - in
a kava ceremony a faked death occurs followed by
bula:
|
... The
cord is decorated with small white cowries,
not only a sign of chieftainship but by
name, buli leka, a continuation of
the metaphor of birth - buli, 'to
form', refers in Fijian procreation theory
to the conceptual acception of the male in
the body of the woman. The sacrificed child
of the people will thus give birth to the
chief.
But only
after the chief, ferocious outside cannibal
who consumes the cannibalized victim, has
himself been sacrificed by it. For when the
ruler drinks the sacred offering, he is in
the state of intoxication Fijians call 'dead
from' (mateni) or 'dead from kava'
(mate ni yaqona), to recover from
which is explicitly 'to live' (bula). This
accounts for the second cup the chief is
alone accorded, the cup of fresh water. The
god is immediately revived, brought again to
life - in a transformed state ...
... There
is a further motivation of the same in the
kava taken immediately after the
chief's by the herald, a representative of
the land. This drinking is 'to kick',
rabeta, the chief's kava ... |
|
To 'kick' is to force into
action, I think, to get moving again, show
signs of life. I thought about rabeta
when I wrote that sun must be 'kicked' in
order for Sunday to arrive.
The darkest time is a time of
non-action, non-life. For light to come
again someone has to take the initiative. |
|
