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TRANSLATIONS
It is time to move on to tahana in
the glyph dictionary. At the same time I
will move focus from G and K to the texts of
H, P, and Q.
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A few preliminary
remarks and imaginations:
1. While
classifying glyphs according to GD types, I found it necessary to
refer from GD61 (tahana) to similar shapes in GD64 (rau
hei) and in GD68 (ika hiku):
The reason is that the top part of the glyphs share the common
trait of being bifurcated.
A rau hei glyph looks like a fish with head down, and
probably the meaning is a hanging victim ('fish', ika). Also
ika hiku (tail fish) seems to depict some sort of 'fish'. Possibly,
therefore, also tahana is
a kind of fish. |
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2.
The 20th kuhane station is
Taharoa.
Although the possible clue tahana from Metoro is
not much to go on, we could perhaps read tahana as an
allusion to Taharoa.
When sun is going down he is inclining his head (hakataha):
Taha.
To lean; to go down (of the sun in the evening). Taha-taha.
1. Side, edge; shore: taha-taha tai. 2. To move from
side to side (of a boat), to swing. Vanaga.
1. To bend,
sloping, to go hither and thither, to evade; ki taha, near;
taha ke, to go in different directions; tahataha,
frontier, horizon; hiriga tahataha, to cross, to go across;
hakataha, to divert, to turn away, to go aside, to be on one
side, to dodge, to shun, oblique, to incline the head, to turn over
on another side, to avoid, to subject; mata hakataha, to
consider; tae hakataha, immovable. 2. To tear. Tahatai
(taha 1 - tai), littoral, coast, shore; tahatahatai,
coast. Churchill.
As to the following -na, we could say that the boat of the
sun has come close to the horizon in the west, close to us who live
here (ná). Both sun and moon appear larger when they are
close to the horizon.
Ná,
here; ná ku-tomo-á te miro, the boat has arrived here.
Vanaga.
1. When, as
soon as (ga). Mgv.: na, because, seeing that,
whereas. 2. The, that, some, any, certain (ga); pei na,
thus, like that. P Mq.: na, the (plural). Ta.: na,
id. 3. Of. P Pau.: na, of, belonging to. Mgv.: na,
of, by, on account of. Mq.: na, of, by, for, on the part
of.Ta.: na, of, by, for. 4. ? possessive; na mea,
to belong to (? his thing). Mgv.: na, him, of him, to him.
Ta.: na, he, his, him. 5. (ana 2); i muri oo
na, to accompany. Churchill.
Quite interesting it is to find Taharoa described in
Manuscript E as the place when the king
stopped all movements by powerful incantations in order to bar
the canoe of his sister queen Ava Rei Pua to come first to the shore of the island.
I think it
was a time of solstice (when sun stands still).
"He worked mana in the fishing grounds." It could
refer to the winter
solstice (where there should be fishes, in the middle of the 'water'
season).
The following (21st)
kuhane station is Hanga Hoonu, The Bay of Turtles, and
the explorers found it full with fishes:
... Again they went on
and reached Hanga Hoonu. They saw it, looked around, and gave
the name 'Hanga Hoonu A Hau Maka'. On the same day, when they
had reached the Bay of Turtles, they made camp and rested. They all
saw the fish that were there, that were present in large numbers -
Ah!
Then they all went into
the water, moved toward the shore, and threw the fish (with their
hands) onto the dry land. There were great numbers (? ka-mea-ro)
of fish. There were tutuhi, paparava, and tahe mata
pukupuku. Those were the three kinds of fish
...
Tahana is not mentioned as one of the 3 kinds of fish, but
tahana could depict a kind of fish. |
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"The two hulls were no longer kept lashed together
(i.e., they were separated for the rest of the journey).
Hotu called out to the canoe of the queen:
'Steer the canoe to the left side when you sail in. Teke will
jump over on board (your) canoe to work his mana when you sail
through the fishing grounds!'
Teke jumped on board the second canoe,
(that) of the queen. The king's canoe sailed to the right, the
queen's to the left. Honga worked his mana in the
fishing grounds. (List of five fishing grounds that belong to
Hotu and Honga.) Teke worked his mana in
the fishing grounds to the left side. (List of nine fishing grounds
that belong to Hotu and Teke.)
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.
(Naming of two fishing grounds.)
When Hotu's canoe had reached Taharoa,
the vaginal fluid (of Hotu's pregnant wife) appeared.
They sailed towards Hanga Hoonu,
where the mucus (kovare seems to refer to the amniotic sac in
this case) appeared.
They sailed on and came to Rangi Meamea,
where the amniotic fluid ran out and the conctractions began. They
anchored the canoe in the front part of the bay, in Hanga
Rau. The canoe of Ava Rei Pua also arrived and
anchoraged.
After Hotu's canoe had anchoraged, the
child of Vakai and Hotu appeared. It was Tuu Maheke,
son of Hotu, a boy. After the canoe of Ava Rei Pua had
also arrived and anchoraged, the child of Ava Rei Pua was
born. It was a girl named Ava Rei Pua Poki." |
In the 2nd list of place names the 5th
station is ra tahai a uo:
"We now come to a bay farther
to the north where Ahu Tahai is
located and the site of recent archeological
investigations. I received the additional
information 'across from Ana O Tai'
(compare PH:501). The name Tahai also
occurs in southern New Zealand and in
Vanua Levu." (Barthel 2)
Barthel has coordinated the 5th station with
a moon age of ca 23-25 nights. Moon is on
her way of going down (taha):
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Taha
To lean;
to go
down (of the sun in the evening). Taha-taha. 1.
Side, edge; shore: taha-taha
tai. 2. To move from
side to side (of a boat), to
swing. Vanaga.
1. To bend,
sloping, to go hither and
thither, to evade; ki taha,
near; taha ke,
to go in
different directions;
tahataha,
frontier, horizon;
hiriga tahataha, to
cross, to go across; hakataha,
to divert, to turn away, to go
aside, to be on one side, to
dodge, to shun, oblique, to
incline the head,
to turn over
on another side, to avoid, to
subject; mata hakataha,
to consider; tae hakataha,
immovable. 2. To tear. PS Mgv.:
tahataha, to cut into
pieces. Sa., To., Fu.: tafa,
to cut, to gash. Viti: tava,
id. Churchill.
Moe tahae, to be a light sleeper. Tahatai (taha
1 - tai), littoral, coast, shore; tahatahatai, coast.
Churchill. |
She is going down in the east, therefore a
female such as Ava Rei Pua must
move towards the east (and along the north coast
to join the king).
She therefore had to move separately (tahaga)
from the other canoe, the canoe of the sun
king.
| Tahaga Adverb: without any particular reason, just like
that. Vanaga.
1. Only, solely, alone, wholly,
without stopping, always, quite, a sort of superlative; noho tahaga,
bachelor, keukeu tahaga, to go without stopping; topa tahaga,
quite unexpected; puoa tahaga, always clad; nui tahaga, to
superabound; tatagi tahaga, inconsolable; roaroa tahaga,
middle finger (the longest); tahaga no mai, a more positively
superlative statement. P Mgv.: tahaga, only, alone, solely. Mq.:
tahakahaka, stripped of brushwood. 2. Irascible; tuhi tahaga, to accuse, to
calumniate. 3. (taha 2) A sacrifice. Churchill.
Pau. Tahaga, indecent. Ta.: tahaa, naked.
Mq.: tahanahana, cleared, uncovered. Ma.: tahaga, naked.
Tahaki, the side. Sa.: tafa'i, one side. Ma.: tahaki,
one side. Mgv.: Tahaki, a man with red hair and florid skin. Mq.:
tahaki, red. Ta.:
Tahavahava, dirty, soiled. Ma.: tahawahawa, to defile, to
pollute. Churchill. |
I.e., moon and sun come together in the
middle of the month, then must separate from
each other, in preparation for a new moon to
be born. But when a new sun is on his way
to be born, his mother is on board the sun
canoe, it seems.
Another aspect of movement towards the
horizon (tahataha) is the aspect of
'death', i.e. to be 'swallowed' by the mouth
of the earth mother, a necessary step for
giving new life. Life is a process of
decreasing entropy and it can be
accomplished only by increased entropy, by a
sacrifice (tahaga) from somebody (there is not room for more than a
certain number of people on the island).
From the flotsam a new 'canoe' will then be
built.
This reasoning leads to a further possible connection
between the 3 'kinds of fishes':
Rau hei clearly is a sacrificed
'fish' and ika hiku is a 'tail fish'
(presumably the end of somebody, viz. a
season).
The word taha means the side and
tahi means one, and both begin with
ta, the word for copying (exactly as in
the construction of the new 'canoe'):
| Tá
OR. Write, writing. The name of writing before the
term rongorongo in 1871 became current. Fischer.
1. To tattoo ( = tatú), to tattoo pictures
on the skin, also: he-tá ite kona, tá-kona. 2. To weave (a
net): he-tá i te kupega. 3. To shake something, moving it
violently up and down and from one side to the other; he-tá e te
tokerau i te maga miro, the wind shakes
the branches of the trees; also in the iterative form:
e-tá-tá-ana e te tokerau i te tôa, the
wind continuously shakes the leaves of the sugarcane. 4.
To pull something up suddenly, for instance, an eel just caught,
dropping it at once on a stone and killing it: he-tá i te koreha.
Tá-tá-vena-vena,
ancient witching formula. Vanaga.
1. Of. 2. This, which. 3. Primarily to strike:
to sacrifice, to tattoo, to
insert, to imprint, to write, to draw, to
copy, to design, to color, to paint, to plaster, to note,
to inscribe, to record, to describe, number, letter, figure,
relation; ta hakatitika, treaty; ta igoa, sign; ta
ki, secretary; ta kona, to tattoo; ta vanaga,
secretary. Churchill.
... the root ta through its long series of
known combinations carries a strongly featured sense of action that
is peripheral, centrifugal, and
there seems to be at least a suspicion of the further connotation
that the action is exerted downward
... The secondary sense of cutting will easily be seen to be a
striking with a specialized implement, and we find this sense stated
without recognition of the primal striking sense only in Mangareva,
Nukuoro, Viti, and Malekula. In Indonesia this secondary sense is
predominant, although Malagasy ta may come somewhat close to
the striking idea ... Churchill 2. |
Two must separate (taha) in
order for the destruction (ta) of one (tahi) to give life for
another one (tahi). We are back at the beginning, where / when Ulu
sacrificed his life for his son Mokuola.
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