4 Okahu a uka ui hetuu.	0
14 hatu ngoio a taotao ika.	10
24 ko ehu ko mahatua a piki rangi a hakakihikihi mahina	20

Let us begin, however, with the more familiar. Ika (fish or 'fish') at the end apparently is there in order to determine more precisely the quality of taotao in this instance.

Îka 1. Fish. 2. In some cases, animal in general: îka ariga koreh[v?]a, animal with the face of a koreva fish (name given to horses when they arrived on the island, because of the resemblance of their heads with that of a koreva). 3. Victim (wounded or killed), enemy who must be killed, person cursed by a timo and destined to die; îka reirei, vanquished enemy, who is kicked (rei). 4. Corpse of man fallen in war. Vanaga. 1. Fish, animal; ika rere, flying fish; ivi ika, fishbone; mata ika, pearl. P Pau., Mgv., Mq.: ika, fish. Ta.: ia, id. 2. Prey, victim, sacrifice; ika ke avai mo, abuse; hakarere ki te ika, to avenge. T Mgv.: ikaiara, to quarrel; ikatamamea, to be angry because another has handled one's property. Mq.: ika, enemy, what causes horror. Ma.: ika, the first person killed in a fight. Mangaia: ika, a victim for sacrifice. 3? matamata ika, snow. Ikahi, to fish with a line, to angle. Mq.: ikahi, id. Ikakato, to go fishing. Ikakohau, to fish with a line, to angle. Ikapotu, cape, end of a voyage, destination; ikapotu hakarere, to abut, to adjoin; topa te ikapotu, id.; tehe oho te ikapotu, id.; mei nei tehe i oho mai ai inei te ikapotu, as far as, to. Ikapuhi, to fish with a torch. Mq.: ikapuhi, id. Churchill.

Both ika and tao are labels for glyph types:

ika	tao
'rising fish'	'hot bun'

Item 14 is 'halfway' to Rano Raraku and also the 1st item beyond the 'bad day' (kino) for the Sun king, when I imagine his 'beastly apparel' was magically 'strangled' (here) by kaikai strings, stopped in his fierce growing ('kai') because his 'fire' would otherwise consume the whole island.

1 ko apina iti.ko rapa kura.he oho mai he	12
12 vai poko aa raa mata turu
13 ko te hereke a kino ariki
14 hatu ngoio a taotao ika.	15
28 ko tongariki a henga eha tunu kioe hakaputiti.ai
ka haka punenenene henua mo opoopo o
29 ko te rano a raraku.

The Inuit peoples, who live practically alongside the Polynesians (because the ocean is no obstacle but an easy route for travellers, as Heyerdahl has taught us), had quite similar views regarding how Sun should be afraid of string games. The following are relevant excerpts from Arctic Sky:

... string games could be resumed after it was clear that the Sun had managed to leave the horizon and was rapidly gaining in altitude: 'Before the sun starts to leave the horizon ... when it shows only on the horizon, ... then string games were no longer allowed as they might lacerate the sun. Once the sun had started to go higher and could be seen in its entirety, string games could be resumed, if one so wished. So the restriction on playing string games was only applicable during the period between the sun's return and its rising fully above the horizon ... ... I knew of two men who lived in another settlement on the Noatak river. They did not believe in the spirit of the string figures, but said they originated from two stars, agguk, which are visible only when the sun has returned after the winter night. One of these men was inside a dance-house when a flood of mist poured in ... His two companions rapidly made and unmade the figure 'Two Labrets', an action intended to drive away the spirit of the string figures, uttering the usual formula ... but the mist kept pouring in ... ... Again, in a diary entry dated 18 December 1913 Jenness notes the same Alak telling him that 'they never played cat's cradles while two stars called agruk were visible, just before the long days of summer... They played other games then, like whizzer [a noise maker] ... ... Alak's comments indicate that, for the Noatak area at least, the appearance of Aagjuuk, rather than the Sun, signalled the end of the string-game season. And the opinion ... that string figures came from, and are therefore related to, Aagjuuk may have given rise to the prohibition against playing them after the solstice appearance of these stars. It is also possible that the string game mentioned by Alak - 'Two Labrets' - rapidly made and unmade in an attempt to drive off the 'string figure spirit', was intended to symbolize Aagjuuk's two stars and so confound the constellation with its own likeness or spirit. ... Etalook refers to the 'aagruuk' as 'labrets' (the circular lower-lip ornaments of some Western Arctic Eskimo groups, certainly evoke an astral image if we recall that early Inuit gaphic representations of stars were usually circular ...) giving them, it seems, an alternate name, ayaqhaagnailak, 'they prohibit the playing of string games': They are the ones that discourage playing a string game... That's what they're called, ayaqhaagnailak, those two stars... When the two stars come out where is no daylight, people are advised not to play a string game then, but with hii, hii, hii... toy noisemakers of wood or bone and braided sinew...

We should notice that the skin of Sun can be lacerated by kaikai strings, which idea might explain hereke (in item 13) - translated as 'festering wound, cracked skin' by Barthel. Possibly the women on Easter Island had to sing the right songs together with the proper kaikai games at midsummer. Among the Inuit Sun was female and Moon male, which probably explains why men could play with string games.

12 indicates the cycle of Spring Sun, the 'beast'. Then comes woman, man, and the gods:

In this version of cosmos a woman is at top center and the turtle at the base is oriented horizontally. Instead of 3 'costumes' for Sun (spring, autumn, winter - in high summer he is decapitated) Moon has 7 'attires'. Her necklace forms a double 'zero':

puo	vaha kai

I suggest the 'rising fish' in item 14 is Moon at the time of her 'birth', i.e. when she has stopped the voracious spring 'beast' and taken charge of the threatening situation (by using her invisible strings).

In the picture above she is born at left, where the woman is standing, reaches her full moon phase at center (at winter solstice), and during the season of the beast (spring) she generates offspring. The multiple heads of the serpent illustrates the season of plenty.

The double-oval necklace is a sign which is carried from the woman at left and up to the time when Sun is reborn at the beginning of spring. The world mountain in the background is encircled by clouds.

 

14 hatu ngoio a taotao ika.	15
28 ko tongariki a henga eha tunu kioe hakaputiti.ai
ka haka punenenene henua mo opoopo o
29 ko te rano a raraku.

She is growing in importance when daylight is waning. It can also be imagined that she is carrying next year's Sun child to be born in midwinter.

In her role as 'Waxing Moon' she must be a 'rising fish'. She moves from west (from the North Cape) to east, as we can recall (cfr at Tahana):

... The men on board the royal canoe looked out from Varinga Te Toremo (the northeastern cape of the Poike peninsula). Then they saw the canoe of the queen, the canoe of Ava Rei Pua, as it reached Papa Te Kena (on the northern shore, east of Hanga Oteo).

Honga came and gazed in the direction below (i.e., toward the west). He called out to the noteworthy ruler (? ariki motongi) Hotu: 'There is the canoe of the queen! It will be the first one to land!' At this news King Hotu replied to Honga, 'Recite (rutu) ('powerful incantations') as though the ten brothers of the chief (ariki maahu) were one whole (?).' The ten recited with all their might. This is what they recited: 'Let all movement (? konekone) cease!' They recited and sailed on swiftly: Honga, Te Kena, Nuku Kehu, Nga Vavai, Oti, Tive (corrected for 'Sive'), Ngehu, Hatu, Tuki, and Pu (corrected for 'Bu'). He worked mana in the fishing grounds ...

We should notice that Hatu was number 8 of the 10, and figure 8 is a double-oval sign.

 

Tao 1. To cook in an oven, to sacrifice. P Mgv., Mq., Ta.: tao, to cook in an oven. 2. To carry away. 3. Abscess, bubo, scrofula, boil, gangrene, ulcer, inflammation, sore. Mgv.: taotaovere, small red spots showing the approach of death. Mq.: toopuku, toopuu, boil, wart, tumor. Ta.: taapu, taapuu, scrofula on neck and chin. 4. Mgv.: a lance, spear. Ta.: tao, id. Sa.: tao, id. Ma.: tao, id. 5. Mgv.: taotaoama, a fish. Sa.:  taotaoama, id. 6. Ta.: taoa, property, possessions. Ma.: taonga, property, treasure. Churchill. Sa.: tao, to bake; taofono, taona'i, to bake food the day before it is used; tau, the leaves used to cover an oven. To.: tao, to cook food in a oven, to bake. Fu.: taò, to put in an oven, to cook. Niuē: tao, to bake. Uvea: tao, to cook, to bake. Ma., Rapanui: tao, to bake or cook in a native oven, properly to steam, to boil with steam. Ta.: tao, the rocks and leaves with which a pig is covered when cooking; baked, boiled, cooked. Mq., Mgv., Mg., Tongareva: tao, to bake in an oven ... The word refers to the specific manner of cookery which involves the pit oven. The suggestion in the Maori, therefore, does not mean a different method; it is but an attempt more precisely to describe the kitchen method, a very tasty cookery, be it said. The suggestion of boiling is found only in Tahiti, yet in his dictionary Bishop Jaussen does not record it under the word bouillir; boiling was little known to the Polynesians before the European introduction of pottery and other fire-resisting utensils ... Churchill 2. Kao-kao, v. Haw., be red. Root and primary meaning obsolete in Haw. Sam., tao, to bake. Marqu., tao, bake, roast, sacrifice. Tah., tao, baked, boiled, cooked. Greek, καιω, Old Att. καω, to light, kindle, burn, scorch. According to Liddell and Scott, Pott refers καιω to Sanskrit çush, be dry, but Curtius rejects this. In Dravid. (Tamil) kay, to be hot, burn. Fornander.

Maybe a double form refers to Moon (who is twofold).

14 hatu ngoio a taotao ika.	15
28 ko tongariki a henga eha tunu kioe hakaputiti.ai
ka haka punenenene henua mo opoopo o
29 ko te rano a raraku.

Barthel 2: "... The additional name 'fish are prepared in the earth-oven' may be a euphemism for cannibalism."

Did they eat the spring sun? Having caught him in the net of kaikai strings, why not? December, Ko Koró, is a month of feasting. We should remember the disgusting feastings in Europe once upon a time (cfr at pare):

  ... At mid-summer, at the end of a half-year reign, Hercules is made drunk with mead and led into the middle of a circle of twelve stones arranged around an oak, in front of which stands an altar-stone; the oak has been lopped until it is T-shaped. He is bound to it with willow thongs in the 'five-fold bond' which joins wrists, neck, and ankles together, beaten by his comrades till he faints, then flayed, blinded, castrated, impaled with a mistletoe stake, and finally hacked into joints on the altar-stone. His blood is caught in a basin and used for sprinkling the whole tribe to make them vigorous and fruitful. The joints are roasted at twin fires of oak-loppings, kindled with sacred fire preserved from a lightning-blasted oak or made by twirling an alder- or cornel-wood fire-drill in an oak log. The trunk is then uprooted and split into faggots which are added to the flames. The twelve merry-men rush in a wild figure-of-eight dance around the fires, singing ecstatically and tearing at the flesh with their teeth ...

By the way, I just happened to notice that Parehe is the name of one of those 3 mountain tops on which the Spaniards marked their possession of the island in 1770.

"On the following day, 20 November 1770, Commander José Bustillo took formal possession of Easter Island 'in the name of the King and of Spain, our Lord and Master Don Carlos the third', renaming the island 'San Carlos'.  

Several hundred Rapanui - probably members of the Koro 'o 'Orongo tribe of the eastern 'Otu 'Iti - observed the ceremony not far from Poike's parasitic cones Parehe, Teatea, and Vai 'a Heva, on the tops of which the Spaniards had planted three crosses. Following three boisterous 'Viva el Rey!' for each cross, the land party let off three salvos of musketry, whereupon the two Spanish vessels San Lorenzo and Santa Rosalia responded with 21 cannon salutes. 

Spain's foremost historian of the Pacific, Francisco Mellén Blanco, has written of the event: 'The spectacle must have been awe-inspiring for the islanders. The parade of uniformed soldiers; the fluttering flags; the chaplains in their surplices chanting out the litany; the beating of drums, and the trilling of fifes must have left a lasting impression on all the natives who witnessed the procession' ..." (Fischer)

This triplet of mountain cones in the northeast resemble the triplet of islets in the southwest, and the Spaniards may have thought it remarkable enough to use the similarity for their ceremony.

My point is that once there was much in common between Polynesians and Europeans.

 

 

With interest we can read of lighting the earth oven for the successful outcome of an enterprise: He ká i te umu mo te hatu o te aga. I suppose the gods must be placated. Or that the spirit of the dead spring 'moa' must return to the sky. Or that the flames will magically induce also Moon to rise.

 

A stone (hatu) does not move, it just sits there. Likewise is someone sitting crosslegged (noho hatu) securely anchoraged:

 

 

A standing person (tagata) can illustrate the fully grown 'person', but not a 'newborn' one:

 

14 hatu ngoio a taotao ika.	15
28 ko tongariki a henga eha tunu kioe hakaputiti.ai
ka haka punenenene henua mo opoopo o
29 ko te rano a raraku.

Goio Mgv.: a black seabird. Mq.: koio, noio, a bird. Ha.: noio, a small black bird that lives on fish. Churchill.