It was after having spent more than a year over at least 10,000 pages of Polynesian myths - collected in the 19th century (there are many more pages available than these) - that the annihilating recognition of our complete ignorance came down upon me like a sledge hammer: there was no single sentence that could be understood.

But then, if anybody was entitled to be taken seriously, it had to be the Polynesians guiding there ships securely over the largest ocean of our globe, navigators to whom our much praised discoverers from Magellan to Captain Cook confided the steering of their ships more than once.

Thus, the fault had to rest with us, not with Polynesain myth. Still, I did not then 'try astronomy for a change' - there was a strict determination on my part to avoid this field. I looked into the archaelogical remains of the many islands, and there a clue was given to me (to call it being struck by lightning would me more correct) which I duly followed up, and then there was no salvation anymore: astronomy could not be escaped.

First it was still 'simple' geometry - the orbit of the sun, the Tropics, the seasons - and the adventures of gods and heroes did not make much more sense even then. Maybe one should count, for a change?

What could it mean, when a hero was on his way slightly more than two years, 'returning' at intervals, 'falling into space', coming off the 'right' route?

There remained, indeed, not many possible solutions: it had to be planets (in the particular case of Aukele-nui-a-iku, Mars). If so, planets had to be constitutive members of every mythical personell, the Polynesians did not invent this trait by themselves."

"By the time of our meeting she had shifted her attention to Polynesia, and soon she hit pay dirt. As she looked into the archaeological remains on many islands, a clue was given to her. The moment of grace came when, on looking (on a map) at two little islands, mere flyspecks on the waters of the Pacific, she found that a strange accumulation of maraes or cult places could be explained only one way: they, and only they, were both exactly sited on two neat celestial coordinates: the Tropics of Cancer and of Capricorn."

(Hamlet's Mill)