TRANSLATIONS

TRANSLATIONS

Robert Graves in his tremendous book 'The White Goddess' explains the meaning of the lapwing:

"The Greeks called the lapwing polyplagtos, 'luring on deceitfully', and had a proverbial phrase 'more beseechful than a lapwing' which they used for artful beggars.

In Wales as a boy I learned to respect the lapwing for the wonderful way in which she camouflages and conceals her eggs in an open field from any casual passer-by.

At first I was fooled every time by her agonized peewit, peewit, screemed from the contrary direction to the one in which her eggs lay, and sometimes when she realized that I was a nest-robber, she would flap about around the ground, pretending to have a broken wing and inviting capture.

But as soon as I had found one nest I could find many. The lapwing's poetic meaning is 'Disguise the Secret' and it is her extraordinary discretion which gives her the claim for sanctity.

According to the Koran she was the repository of King Solomon's secrets and the most intelligent of the flock of prophetic birds that attended him."

I recalled the prominent role of the lapwing in Graves' book when reading in English Etymology that a plover (as in the Golden Plover at water's edge) also was called lapwing.

Maybe the deceit (which certainly is signified by the appearance of this golden bird in the story about Kui and Fakataha) lies in the suggestion that canoes should be straight and not crooked?

On the other hand, if canoes should be crooked - and if everybody knew that - we should not be tricked into believing that was the reason for the appearance of the lapwing.

I believe there are deeper secrets in the story (as in all true myths) and that the search for truth may take us a very far.

The method to unravel such secrets is to slowly wade through the bushes looking everywhere.

In Q we saw that the creator (maybe) compensated for the disappearance of one (canoe) glyph (as compared to P) by adding a new glyph immediately before his canoe:

P			-
Q

I guess that the two GD64 (rau hei) glyphs in Q probably correspond to the two canoes, one rau hei for each canoe. We have established that tapa mea in A shows a canoe and we also know that the sun made his voyage in (or like) a canoe across the sky.

Therefore I believe that in Sunday Hb9-19 has a meaning similar to the two rau hei glyphs in Q:


Hb9-17	Hb9-18	Hb9-19	Hb9-20	Hb9-21

Hb9-20 (manu rere) appears before moe (Hb9-21) presumably to show how the young phase (swift and hungry) will be followed by a more drowsy and satisfied phase later on in life.

Hb9-18 is a sun canoe - I believe - but the order between rau hei and canoe is opposite to the one in Q above. For the moment I have no explanation for that.

The name Fakataka is worth investigating. Faka- clearly is equivalent to the common Polynesian haka- meaning 'doing' etc. At the opposite end of the word -taka give us many alternatives to chose among:

Taka

Taka, takataka. Circle; to form circles, to gather, to get together (of people). Vanaga.

1. A dredge. P Mgv.: akataka, to fish all day or all night with the line, to throw the fishing line here and there. This can only apply to some sort of net used in fishing. We find in Samoa ta'ā a small fishing line, Tonga taka the short line attached to fish hooks, Futuna taka-taka a fishing party of women in the reef pools (net), Maori takā the thread by which the fishhook is fastened to the line, Hawaii kaa in the same sense, Marquesas takako a badly spun thread, Mangareva takara a thread for fastening the bait on the hook. 2. Ruddy. 3. Wheel, arch; takataka, ball, spherical, round, circle, oval, to roll in a circle, wheel, circular piece of wood, around; miro takataka, bush; haga takataka, to disjoin; hakatakataka, to round, to concentrate. P Pau.: fakatakataka, to whirl around. Mq.: taka, to gird. Ta.: taa, circular piece which connects the frame of a house. Churchill.

Takai, a curl, to tie; takaikai, to lace up; takaitakai, to coil. P Pau.: takai, a ball, to tie. Mgv.: takai, a circle, ring, hoop, to go around a thing. Mq.: takai, to voyage around. Ta.: taai, to make into a ball, to attach. Churchill.

As usual in a situation with many alternatives I let my subconsious do the job of picking out the right threads. I feel is that the meaning in some way must be 'circle' and 'tie together' (both meanings at once).

In particular I notice the Tahitian: 'circular piece which connects the frame of a house'. Given my point of departure for translating the rongorongo texts, i.e. three axioms in the form of calendars (day, week, month), everything connected with 'houses' ('doors', 'beams', 'thresholds' etc) must draw attention. The 'houses' are the dwellings of the 'planets', i.e. where they are 'residing' (noho).

'There is a couple residing in one place named Kui and Fakataka' = E i ei te tahi ulugaalī nae nonofo i te tahi fenua, ko Kui ma Fakataka.

In the middle of the night and in the middle of the dark season of the year one period will end and another will start. At that point there must be somebody who ties the ends of the branches together to make a circle, Fakataka.

The circle in question presumably is the cycle of the sun. We notice that one of the meanings of taka is ruddy.

"Ruddy … red, reddish, orig. of the face ..." (English Etymology)

The lapwing indicates the place of birth (at water's edge). Therefore that must also be the place where the tying together is 'bound to happen'. In the sacred geography of Easter Island we must be close to Rano Kau.

Rano

Volcano; crater and lake of a volcano; i-agataiahi i-hopu-ai i te rano, yesterday I bathed in the lake of the volcano. Vanaga.

In Nuclear Polynesian the sense is specialized, the waters of birth being recorded in Samoa and Futuna, and in every case the word refers to the rinsing off of sea water. To wash away the salt water is not only for appearance sake in the tropical Pacific. The sea has a high degree of salinity and the salt crystals are not only the clearly visible signs of an unkempt habit when they glisten upon the brown skins, but they are uncomfortable as well. This use stamps upon lanu a sense in which the fact that it is fresh water is more prominent than the water sense. Churchill 2.

Kau

1. To move one's feet (walking or swimming); ana oho koe, ana kau i te va'e, ka rava a me'e mo kai, if you go and move your feet, you'll get something to eat; kakau (or also kaukau), move yourself swimming. 2. To spread (of plants): ku-kau-áte kumara, the sweet potatoes have spread, have grown a lot. 3. To swarm, to mill around (of people): ku-kau-á te gagata i mu'a i tou hare, there's a crowd of people milling about in front of your house. 4. To flood (of water after the rain): ku-kau-á te vai haho, the water has flooded out (of a container such as a taheta). 5. To increase, to multiply: ku-kau-á te moa, the chickens have multiplied. 6. Wide, large: Rano Kau, "Wide Crater" (name of the volcano in the southwest corner of the island). 7. Expression of admiration: kau-ké-ké! how big! hare kau-kéké! what a big house! tagata hakari kau-kéké! what a stout man! Vanaga.

To bathe, to swim; hakakau, to make to swim. P Pau., Mgv., Mq.: kau, to swim. Ta.: áu, id. Kauhaga, swimming. Churchill.

The explanation (according to Vanaga) of Rano Kau as the Wide Crater is misleading. The primary meaning must instead be connected with life and death, freshwater after saltwater.

To spread wide (of plants), to swarm (of people), to flood (of fresh water), to multiply (of chickens) are meanings which lead further on to 'wide' and 'expression of admiration'.

We have learnt in school that alpha and omega stand for the beginning and the end, but that they somehow are close together anyhow. Why they are close together is usually not explained. But if we bend the string of letters around to make a circle we will understand.

In Robert Graves' quest for understanding he arrives at identifying the lapwing with A:

"Day of the Winter Solstice - A - aidhircleóg, lapwing; alad, piebald.

Why is the Lapwing at the head of the vowels?

Not hard to answer. It is a reminder that the secrets of the Beth-Luis-Nion [the ABC of the pre-latin Ogham alphabet] must be hidden by deception and equivocation, as the lapwing hides her eggs. And Piebald is the colour of this mid-winter season when wise men keep to their chimney-corners, which are black with soot inside and outside white with snow; and of the Goddess of Life-in-Death and Death-in-Life, whose prophetic bird is the piebald magpie."

I guess Robert Graves here is acting as a lapwing himself. The explanation of why the other bird - Piebald - is at winter solstice is obviously evasive.

As I remember it he every day used to read about old meanings of words. So what does piebald mean?

"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 ..." (English Etymology)

Black with white streaks, a crooked bird (pilfering habits) and ultimately with a meaning (according to 'some') 'to be pointed'. That closes the case; we can identify the magpie on Easter Island with manu tara.

Manu tara

Sooty tern. The names of the age levels of the sooty tern were earlier used as children's names (Routledge). These names were (Barthel): pi(u) riuriu, kava 'eo'eo, te verovero, and ka 'ara'ara. Fischer.

Tara

1. Thorn: tara miro. 2. Spur: tara moa. 3. Corner; te tara o te hare, corner of house; tara o te ahu, corner of ahu. Vanaga.

(1. Dollar; moni tara, id.) 2. Thorn, spike, horn; taratara, prickly, rough, full of rocks. 3. To announce, to proclaim, to promulgate, to call, to slander; tatara, to make a genealogy. Churchill

The 'corner of the house' should refer to a cardinal point. The eggs of the lapwing, I guess, are located at the three islets outside Orongo. There they stole the first manu tara egg of the season (as if mimicking the pilferous magpie).

The month March was called Tara Hau, and that 'points' at autumn equinox rather than at winter solstice. Tara Hau corresponds to the two last 'regular' stations of the kuhane of Hau Maka: 23 Peke Tau O Hiti and 24 Mauga Hau Epa.

Uruga. Prophetic vision. It is said that, not long before the first missionaries' coming a certain Rega Varevare a Te Niu saw their arrival in a vision and travelled all over the island to tell it: He-oho-mai ko Rega Varevare a Te Niu mai Poike, he mimiro i te po ka-variró te kaiga he-kî i taana uruga, he ragi: "E-tomo te haûti i Tarakiu, e-tomo te poepoe hiku regorego, e-tomo te îka ariga koreva, e-tomo te poporo haha, e-kiu te Atua i te ragi". I te otea o te rua raá he-tu'u-hakaou ki Poike; i te ahi mo-kirokiro he-mate. Rega Varevare, son of Te Niu, came from Poike, and toured the island proclaiming his vision: "A wooden house will arrive at Tarakiu (near Vaihú), a barge will arrive, animals will arrive with the faces of eels (i.e. horses), golden thistles will come, and the Lord will be heard in heaven". The next morning he arrived back in Poike, and in the evening when it was getting dark, he died. Vanaga.

At Tara-kiu a 'wooden house', 'haûti', (like a barge) will arrive with new strange people on board.

Haúti

Word used in the 19th century for "house," borrowed from English ("house" > haúti). Large houses built in the European style were then called hare haúti. Vanaga.

'... The ancient names of the month were: Tua haro, Tehetu'upú, Tarahao, Vaitu nui, Vaitu poru, He Maro, He Anakena, Hora iti, Hora nui, Tagaroa uri, Ko Ruti, Ko Koró ...'

As we know that He Maro and He Anakena correspond to June and July, we are able to state that 'Tarahao' (Tarahau according to Barthel 2) is March. Autumn equinox 'is' the tara.

In Latin tara becomes Spica, and now we can remove that S because 'IE. *(s)pl- be pointed'.

'Spica signifies, and marks, the Ear of Wheat shown in the Virgin's left hand ...'

'In Chinese astronomy Spica was a great favorite as Kió, the Horn, or Spike, anciently Keok or Guik, the special star of springtime; and with ζ formed their 12th sieu under that title.'

In China tara (Kió) marked spring equinox, not autumn equinox, but China is situated north of the equator and the same month is therefore meant, March. Presumably that Kió has something to do with the Tarakiu pointed out in the vision (uruga) of Rega Varevare a Te Niu. Though Tarakiu is said to be located near Vaihú (i.e. not at Orongo).

Let us return to the two birds, lapwing and piebald. In Barthel 2 (Manuscript E) we can read that when Hotu Matua sailed away to Easter Island he brought birds with him:

"They also took along twenty (birds) each: manu tara (Sterna lunata), piriuriu, kava eoeo, te verovero, ka araara (i.e., the four growth stages of the sea swallow), kukuru toua, makohe (Fregata minor subsp.), kena (Sula dactylatra subsp.?), tavake (Phaeton sp.), ruru (Sula cyanops), taiko (corrected for taino, Pterodroma heraldica paschae), kumara (Oestrelata incerta or leucoptera ?), kiakia (Leucanus albus royanus), tuvi (i.e., tuvituvi, Procelsterna caerulea skottsbergi), tuao (Anous stolidus unicolor), and tavi."

These birds Barthel forms into a list with 16 kinds of birds:

1	manu tara	9	tavake
2	pi riuriu	10	ruru
3	kava eoeo	11	taiko
4	te verovero	12	kumara
5	ka araara	13	kiakia
6	kukuru toua	14	tuvi
7	makohe	15	tuao
8	kena	16	tavi

"The list is headed by the sooty tern, a type of sea swallow, around which revolved the birdman cult of the Motu Nui-Orongo area. Some of the best descriptions of the sooty tern are the colorful paintings of Ana Kai Tangata.

Sterna lunata (Gray-backed Tern) has a pointed beak and a black band like a bandit:

The Sooty Tern (Sterna fuscata) has has a black back and does not wear a bandit band:

"The Grey-backed Tern, Onychoprion lunata, is a seabird in the tern family. A close relative of the Bridled and Sooty Terns (with which it is sometimes confused), the Grey-backed Tern is less common than the other members of its genus and is has been studied less. The three species, along with the Aleutian Tern were recently split into a new genus Onychoprion from Sterna (Bridge et al., 2005). They resemble the Sooty Tern but with a grey back instead of a black one. Their breast and underparts are white, and the have a black eye line from the bill to the back of the head which gives them their other name, the Spectacled Tern.

The Grey-backed Tern breeds on islands of the tropical Pacific Ocean. At the northern end of its distribution it nests in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands (with the largest population being Lisianski Island) and two small islets off Oahu, in the east as far as the Tuamotu Islands, with other colonies in the Society Islands, the Line Islands, Phoenix Islands, Mariana Islands and American Samoa. There are unconfirmed reports of breeding as far south as Fiji, and as far east as Easter Island. Little is known about the populations outside of Hawaii. Outside of the breeding season the species is partly migratory, with birds from the Hawaiian Islands flying south. It is thought that birds in other parts of the Pacific are also migratory, and will disperse as far as Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, and Easter Island." (Internet - Wikipedia)

In Barthel 2 manu tara is translated as not only sooty tern and grey-backed tern, but also as common tern (Sterna hirundo),

though obviously the grey-backed tern must be the manu tara, he is the only one with bandit characteristics.

The arrival and the nesting of these birds at the beginning of the southern spring was the high point of the year. So great was the interest in the bird manu tara that separate names were given to the various stages of his growth: pi(u) riuriu, kava eoeo, te verovero, and ka araara (numbers 2 through 6 [misprint for 5]) are onomatopoetic names based on the characteristic bird call of each stage.

At one time these names, indicating the stages of development of the sooty tern, were popular children's names ..."

We have come a long way astray from the glyphs for the night time in H. But one rule when making a quest is to do just that, not to focus too hard but instead to follow the signs.

A kind of superstructure is slowly taking form in front of us. We cannot understand the phases of time-space without understanding the echoes and reflections in birds, plants, stars etc. Not only do the different fundamental cycles of time-space reflect on each other (moon getting light from the sun and returning it etc), but also do the cycles of time-space take on colour from the events of nature.

This interwoven-ness of the cosmos must be very resistant to changes. Therefore it becomes understandable that the big lightly coloured king of cats (Leo) remains through the ages, and that his opposite the water jar (Aquarius) also must remain. At spring equinox life is returning from the salty sea and at water's edge ('in the freshwater pools on the reef') birth is evident from omens of birds.

Moving across the equator events have to change places - summer becomes winter and winter becomes summer. Spring becomes autumn and autumn becomes spring. Spica at autumn equinox moves to spring equinox, and tara appears there too.