TRANSLATIONS

TRANSLATIONS

My memory insists I should consider a book I read half a lifetime ago: The Mathematical Magpie by Clifton Fadiman (1962). I searched for it in my library and found the book. What had induced Fadiman to include a magpie in the title?

On the hard cover the titel read The Mathematical Mag π. A joke, it seems. Mag for magazine and π for pie. A magpie is a collector of all sorts of things and Fadiman had assembled in his 'magazine' all sorts of mathematical curiosities:

... piebald ... of two colours mingled, esp. white and black ... f. PIE¹ + BALD (in the sense 'streaked with white' ...

pie¹ ... MAGPIE ... L. pīca magpie, rel. to pīcus green woodpecker, and Skr. pikás Indian cuckoo, and referred by some to IE. *(s)pl- be pointed ...

magpie ... common European bird, Pica caudata, noted for its noisy chatter and pilfering habits ... f. Mag, pet-form of Margaret + PIE¹ ... Earlier (dial.) maggot-pie ... f. Maggot - (O)F. Margot, pet-form of Marguerite Margaret ...

I am convinced also ravens have 'pilfering habits'; once I meat a crow who stole my pen and tried to steal other items too. This group of birds are collectors of curiosities. Maybe that is what niu illustrates - an omnivorous general collector:

At the end of a cycle there is recycling, implying return of all kinds of items:

... When it was evident that the years lay ready to burst into life, everyone took hold of them, so that once more would start forth - once again - another (period of) fifty-two years. Then (the two cycles) might proceed to reach one hundred and four years. It was called 'One Age' when twice they had made the round, when twice the times of binding the years had come together.

Behold what was done when the years were bound - when was reached the time when they were to draw the new fire, when now its count was accomplished. First they put out fires everywhere in the country round. And the statues, hewn in either wood or stone, kept in each man's home and regarded as gods, were all cast into the water. Also (were) these (cast away) - the pestles and the (three) hearth stones (upon which the cooking pots rested); and everywhere there was much sweeping - there was sweeping very clear. Rubbish was thrown out; none lay in any of the houses ...

Did he know this connection, Clifton Fadiman? When a cycle is completed, everything must be returned. Everything must be swept out to make it shining again.

The measure of the cycle is 2π and the number of glyphs (628) on each side of the E tablet surely must allude to full cycles - maybe one for sun on side a and one for moon on side b:

6 solar double-months with 30 days in each month, would result in 360 days on side a. 28 lunar light nights for each month, 13 in a year, would result in 364 nights on side b.

628 - 2 * 360 = - 92

628 - 2 * 364 = - 100

192 = 8 * 24. With a measure of 2 glyphs per day 192 corresponds to 8 * 12 = 96 days or about a quarter of a year, possibly the 4th dark quarter with 6 days added (covering 365¼ - 360).

Now, let us continue with next page in the series (where I try to explain the fact of hua poporo at midsummer):

As next step in analysing the story about Ure Honu and the skull of the old king, let us locate in time the weeding of banana plantations. It is an activity due in Ko Ruti, during the 1st half of summer:

2nd quarter	3rd quarter
Tagaroa uri (October)	Tua haro (January)
Cleaning up of the fields. Fishing is no longer taboo. Festival of thanksgiving (hakakio) and presents of fowl.	Fishing. Because of the strong sun very little planting is done.
Ko Ruti (November)	Tehetu'upú (February)
Cleaning of the banana plantations, but only in the morning since the sun becomes too hot later in the day. Problems with drought. Good month for fishing and the construction of houses (because of the long days).	Like the previous month. Some sweet potatoes are planted where there are a lot of stones (pu).
Ko Koró (December)	Tarahao (March)
Because of the increasing heat, work ceases in the fields. Time for fishing, recreation, and festivities. The new houses are occupied (reason for the festivities). Like the previous month, a good time for surfing (ngaru) on the beach of Hangaroa O Tai.	Sweet potatoes are planted in the morning; fishing is done in the afternoon.

New houses were also constructed:

... Another year passed, and a man by the name of Ure Honu went to work in his banana plantation. He went and came to the last part, to the 'head' (i.e., the upper part of the banana plantation), to the end of the banana plantation. The sun was standing just right for Ure Honu to clean out the weeds from the banana plantation.

On the first day he hoed the weeds. That went on all day, and then evening came. Suddenly a rat came from the middle of the banana plantation. Ure Honu saw it and ran after it. But it disappeared and he could not catch it. On the second day of hoeing, the same thing happened with the rat. It ran away, and he could not catch it. On the third day, he reached the 'head' of the bananas and finished the work in the plantation. Again the rat ran away, and Ure Honu followed it. It ran and slipped into the hole of a stone. He poked after it, lifted up the stone, and saw that the skull was (in the hole) of the stone. (The rat was) a spirit of the skull (he kuhane o te puoko) ...

Ure Honu was amazed and said, 'How beautiful you are! In the head of the new bananas is a skull, painted with yellow root and with a strip of barkcloth around it.' Ure Honu stayed for a while, (then) he went away and covered the roof of his house in Vai Matā. It was a new house. He took the very large skull, which he had found at the head of the banana plantation, and hung it up in the new house. He tied it up in the framework of the roof (hahanga) and left it hanging there ...

The new house of Ure Honu was built in Vai Matā, i.e. 'water spearhead'. (I guess matā = matá).

Summer solstice - not winter solstice - is the time of action here. On Hawaii it was the dark time of the year, for Ure Honu it was the season of light. For Pharaoh in Egypt the season was when the waters from the Nile subsided:

... The season of year for this royal ballet was the same as that proper to a coronation; the first five days of the first month of the 'Season of Coming Forth', when the hillocks and fields, following the inundation of the Nile, were again emerging from the waters. For the seasonal cycle, throughout the ancient world, was the foremost sign of rebirth following death, and in Egypt the chronometer of this cycle was the annual flooding of the Nile. Numerous festival edifices were constructed, incensed, and consecrated; a throne hall wherein the king should sit while approached in obeisance by the gods and their priesthoods (who in a crueler time would have been the registrars of his death); a large court for the presentation of mimes, processions, and other such visual events; and finally a palace-chapel into which the god-king would retire for his changes of costume ...

New edifices were constructed when land reappeared after having been under water. Maybe 'water spearhead' (Vai Matā) means the 'death' of water. Yet, the water in question must have disappeared much earlier if it was the 'water' of late winter.

The 'water' after midsummer, it seems, cannot me meant. A better interpretation is therefore 'water spearhead' = the 'spearhead' belonging to 'water', i.e. the 'water' which 'kills' the 1st 'year'.

Water runs downward. After the apex at midsummer water will flow downhill. The intense flames at midsummer are 'finished' in some way, and the reasonable assumption is that celestial water must be involved.

This argumentation agrees with what we saw in the 6th period of the E calendar:

		In the 6th period summer is described, beginning with spring equinox and ending with autumn equinox (Eb3-17--19).
Eb3-7	Eb3-8
40	41

Eb3-9	Eb3-10	Eb3-11	Eb3-12
42	43	44	45

Eb3-13	Eb3-14	Eb3-15	Eb3-16
46	47	48	49

Eb3-17	Eb3-18	Eb3-19
50	51	52

If these 13 glyphs describe the arriving summer, then Eb3-17--18 probably depict a watery stage (autumn?), because we can see fishes.

Disregarding Eb3-19 (which according to its ordinal number, 19, must be beyond summer) we will have a symmetric pattern:

spring equinox	2	6	12
'a.m.'	4	6
'p.m.'	4	6
autumn equinox	2	6

In Eb3-16 a 5-feather maro may indicate the 'end of fire' - fingers mean fire (and also 5). We should remember how the 16th period in the calendars of G and K mark the 'finish' (or start of the 'end') of summer.

From Eb3-7 up to and including Eb3-16 there are 10 glyphs. For the 16th period of K we have reconstructed *13 as the probable number of glyphs, and in periods 16-17 in G we have 16 glyphs.

Ga4-26 is a kind of niu, perhaps to indicate how the 1st 'year' now must be 'recycled':

15
15	Ga4-23	Ga4-24	Ga4-25	Ga4-26	Ga4-27
16
16	Ga5-1	Ga5-2	Ga5-3

The hand is folded down in the new season, beginning in a way with period 16 and a new glyph line. Rei no longer is 'enlightened' by moon signs, i.e. the old guiding star is no longer of any value.

In Ga4-27 there is a 4-feather maro in harmony with the end of the 4 quarters of the 1st 'year' or with the end of the 4 quarters of the 1st half of summer.

Henua in Ga4-27 is cut short at the top end and in Ga5-3 henua is open - a sign of 'ghost' status.