247. Yesterday evening,
happening on
another TV-program, I saw a Hawaiian woman who chuckled when interviewed
about what memories remained after Captain
Cook's visit to the island 240 years
earlier. Let's remind ourselves:
... Cook's first visit, to Kaua'i Island in
January 1778, fell within the traditional
months of the New Year rite (Makahiki).
He returned to the Islands late in the same
year, very near the recommencement of the
Makahiki ceremonies. Arriving now off
northern Maui, Cook proceeded to make a
grand circumnavigation of Hawai'i Island in
the prescribed clockwise direction of Lono's
yearly procession, to land at the temple in
Kealakekua Bay where Lono begins and ends
his own circuit.
The British captain took his leave in early
February 1779, almost precisely on the day
the Makahiki ceremonies closed. But on his
way out to Kahiki, the Resolution sprung a
mast, and Cook committed the ritual fault of
returning unexpectedly and unintelligibly.
The Great Navigator was now hors
catégorie, a dangerous condition as
Leach and Douglas have taught us, and within
a few days he was really dead - though
certain priests of Lono did afterward ask
when he would come back ...
... Nevertheless, by virtue of a series of
spectacular coincidences, Cook made a
near-perfect ritual exit on the night of 3
February. The timing itself was nearly
perfect, since the Makahiki rituals
would end 1 February (±1 day), being the
14th day of the second Hawaiian month [Kau-lua].
This helps explain Mr. King's entry for 2
February in the published Voyage: 'Terreoboo
[Kalaniopu'u] and his Chiefs, had,
for some days past, been very inquisitive
abouth the time of our departure' - to which
his private journal adds, '& seem'd well
pleas'd that it was soon'. Captain Cook,
responding to Hawaiian importunities to
leave behind his 'son', Mr. King [sic!], had even
assured Kalaniopu'u and the high
priest that he would come back again the
following year. Long after they had killed
him, the Hawaiians continued to believe this
would happen.
With the high priest's permission, the
British just before leaving removed the
fence and certain images of Hikiau
temple for firewood. Debate raged in the
nineteenth century about the role of this
purported 'sacriledge' in Cook's death,
without notice, however, that following
Lono's sojourn the temple is normally
cleared and rebuilt - indeed, the night the
British left one of the temple houses was
set on fire. Among the other ritual coincidences, perhaps
the most remarkable was the death of poor
old Willie Watman, seaman A. B., on the
morning of 1 February. Watman was the first
person among Cook's people to die at
Kealakekua: on the ceremonial day, so far as
can be calculated, that the King's living
god Kahoali'i would swallow the eye of the
first human sacrifice of the New Year. And
it was the Hawaiian chief - or by one
account, the King himself - who specifically
requested that old Watman be buried at
Hikiau temple.
Messrs. Cook and King read the burial
service, thus introducing Christianity to
the Sandwich Islands, with the assistance
however of the high priest Ka'oo'oo and the
Lono 'brethren', who when the English had
finished proceeded to make sacrifices and
perform ceremonies at the grave for three
days and nights.
So in the early hours of 4 February, Cook
sailed out of Kealakekua Bay, still alive
and well. The King, too, had survived Lono's
visit and incorporated its tangible
benefits, such as iron adzes and daggers. In
principle, the King would now make
sacrifices to Kuu and reopen the
agricultural shrines of Lono. The normal
cosmic course would be resumed.
Hence the ultimate ritual coincidence, which
was meteorological: one of the fertilizing
storms of winter, associated with the advent
of Lono, wreaked havoc with the foremast of
the Resolution, and the British were forced
to return to Kealakekua for repairs on 11
February 1779
...
Mr. King remarks that there were not as
many hundreds of people at their return to
Kealakekua as there had been thousands when
they first came in. A tabu was in effect,
which was ascribed to the king's absence. By
the best evidence, the British had
interrupted the annual bonito-fishing rite,
the transition from the Makahiki season to
normal temple ceremonies. Cook was now
hors cadre. And things fell apart
...
... Early on Sunday morning, 14 February 1779, Captain Cook went ashore with a
party of marines to take the Hawaiian king,
Kalaniopu'u, hostage against the return of
the Discovery's cutter, stolen the night
before in a bold maneuver - of which,
however, the amiable old ruler was
innocent. At the decisive moment, Cook and
Kalaniopu'u, the God and the King, will
confront each other as cosmic adversaries. Permit me thus an anthropological reading of
the historical texts. For in all the
confused Tolstoian narratives of the affray
- among which the judicious Beaglehole
refuses to choose - the one recurrent
certainty is a dramatic structure with the
properties of a ritual transformation.
During the passage inland to find the king,
thence seaward with his royal hostage, Cook
is metamorphosed from a being of veneration
to an object of hostility. When he came
ashore, the common people as usual dispersed
before him and prostrated face to earth; but
in the end he was himself precipitated face
down in the water by a chief's weapon, an
iron trade dagger, to be rushed upon by a
mob exulting over him, and seeming to add to
their own honors by the part they could
claim in his death: 'snatching the daggers
from each other', reads Mr. Burney's
account, 'out of eagerness to have their
share in killing him'. In the final ritual
inversion, Cook's body would be offered in
sacrifice by the Hawaiian King ...
The Hawaiian woman who was interviewed chuckled because the assassination of Captain
Cook coincided with the day we have named All Hearts' Day
- when in February 14 (2-14) the war-god Kuu
returned to power. The assassination of
Julius Caesar came a month (29 days) later
(and 365 - 29 = 336 = 14 * 24 = 12 * 28):
... The brutes of spring caused the downfall
of both Captain Cook and Julius Caesar. We
are close to the key myth of mankind, that
which explains the regeneration of sun and
of growth. Once at least some people kept
the tradition living. I became interested in
what really happened at March 15 and
reopened Henrikson to find out: Caesar had
been forewarned of the threat by the prophet
Spurinna, who told him that a great threat
was coming at Idus Martiae or
just before [i.e. at 3-14]. The day arrived
and Caesar was still living, walking to his
meeting with the Senate when he happened to
encounter Spurinna and told him jokingly
that he was still alive. Spurinna calmely
answered that the day had yet not ended.
The Romans divided their months in two parts
and the dividing point was Idus,
which in some way was connected with full
moon. March 15 was the midpoint of March,
which is close to spring equinox. The old
agricultural year defined the beginning of
the year to the time when sun returned, and
it was connected with Mars
...
The old year ended at February 1 - when
poor old Willie Watman died - when the king's
living god Kahoali'i swallowed
the eye of the first human sacrifice of the
New Year.
... in the ceremonial course of the coming
year, the king is symbolically transposed
toward the Lono pole of Hawaiian
divinity ... It need only be noticed that
the renewal of kingship at the climax of the
Makahiki coincides with the rebirth
of nature. For in the ideal ritual calendar,
the kali'i battle follows the
autumnal appearance of the Pleiades, by
thirty-three days - thus precisely, in the
late eighteenth century, 21 December, the
winter solstice. The king returns to power
with the sun. Whereas, over the next two
days, Lono plays the part of the
sacrifice. The Makahiki effigy is
dismantled and hidden away in a rite watched
over by the king's 'living god',
Kahoali'i or
'The-Companion-of-the-King', the one who is
also known as 'Death-is-Near' (Koke-na-make).
Close kinsman of the king as his ceremonial
double, Kahoali'i swallows the eye of
the victim in ceremonies of human sacrifice
...
... In the morning of the world, there was
nothing but water. The Loon was calling, and
the old man who at that time bore the
Raven's name, Nangkilstlas, asked her
why. 'The gods are homeless', the Loon
replied. 'I'll see to it', said the old man,
without moving from the fire in his house on
the floor of the sea. Then as the old man
continued to lie by his fire, the Raven flew
over the sea. The clouds broke. He flew
upward, drove his beak into the sky and
scrambled over the rim to the upper world.
There he discovered a town, and in one of
the houses a woman had just given birth.
The Raven stole the skin and form of the
newborn child. Then he began to cry for
solid food, but he was offered only mother's
milk. That night, he passed through the town
stealing an eye from each inhabitant. Back
in his foster parents' house, he roasted the
eyes in the coals and ate them, laughing.
Then he returned to his cradle, full and
warm. He had not seen the old woman watching
him from the corner - the one who never
slept and who never moved because she was
stone from the waist down. Next morning,
amid the wailing that engulfed the town, she
told what she had seen. The one-eyed people
of the sky dressed in their dancing clothes,
paddled the child out to mid-heaven in their
canoe and pitched him over the side
...
Next date came 10 days later, in the midst
of the annual bonito-fishing rite:
... the British were forced to return to
Kealakekua for repairs on 11 February 1779
...
Mr. King remarks that there were not as
many hundreds of people at their return to
Kealakekua as there had been thousands when
they first came in. A tabu was in effect,
which was ascribed to the king's absence. By
the best evidence, the British had
interrupted the annual bonito-fishing rite,
the transition from the Makahiki season to
normal temple ceremonies. Cook was now
hors cadre. And things fell apart
...
... I'a
is the general
name for
fishes,' Pratt
notes in his
Samoan
dictionary,
'except the
bonito and
shellfish
(mollusca and
crustacea).'
We may forgive
the inaccuracy
of the biology
in our gratitude
for the former
note. The bonito
is not a fish,
the bonito is a
gentleman, and
not for worlds
would Samoa
offend against
his state. The
Samoan in his
'upu fa'aaloalo
has his own
Basakrama, the
language of
courtesy to be
used to them of
high degree, to
chiefs and
bonitos.
One does not say
that he goes to
the towns which
are favorably
situated for the
bonito fishery;
he says rather
that (funa'i)
he goes into
seclusion, he
withdraws
himself. He
finds that the
fleet which is
to chase the
bonito has an
honourable name
for this use,
that the chief
fisher has a
name that he
never uses
ashore. He will
not in so many
words say that
he is going to
fish for bonito,
he says that he
is going out
paddling in the
courtesy
language (alo);
he even avoids
all chance of
offending this
gentleman of his
seas by saying,
instead of the
blunt vulgarity
of the word
fishing, rather
that he is
headed in some
other direction
(fa'asanga'ese).
He does not
paddle with the
common word but
with that (pale)
which he uses in
compliment to
his chief's
canoe. He will
not so much as
speak the word
which means
canoe; he calls
it by another
word (tafānga),
which may mean
the turning away
to one side.
In this
unmentioned
canoe he may not
carry water by
its common name,
he must call it
(mālū)
the cool stuff.
He will not
mention his eyes
in the canoe; he
calls his visor
(taulauifi)
the shield for
his chestnut
leaves.
Even the word
for large
becomes
something else (sumalie)
in this great
game. The hook
must be tied
with ritual
care; it is
called (pa)
out of the
common name for
hook; no bonito
will take a hook
which has not
been properly
tied; the
fastening is
veiled under the
name (fanua)
for the land.
There are many
rules to
observe; their
disregard is
called (sopoliu)
the stepping
over the bilges,
from the most
unfortunate
thing that the
fisher can do.
He may hail the
bonito by his
name (atu),
or he may call
him
affectionately
or coaxingly (pa'umasunu)
old singed-skin.
If he has the
fortune to hook
his bonito he
must raise the
shout of
triumph,
Tu! Tu! Tu e!,
not his whole
name but one of
its syllables;
he triumphs as
over a foe
honorably slain
in combat, but
he avoids
hurting the
feelings of the
other gentlemen
of the sea.
The first bonito
caught in a new
canoe he calls (ola)
life; the first
bonito caught in
any season bears
a special name (ngatongiā),
of uncertain
signification,
and he presents
it to his chief.
His catch he
reckons by a
special
notation; to his
numerals he adds
the word (tino)
body; he counts
them as
one-body,
two-body,
three-body.
Parts of the
gentleman have
specific names
of their own;
his fins (asa)
and his entrails
(fe'afe'a)
are called in
terms nowhere
else employed;
the tidbit of
the belly part,
which the fisher
must give to his
chief, is called
(ma'alo)
by the honorific
title of the
chief's abdomen.
And if the rites
were not duly
observed, if the
hook was not
rightly tied, if
the fisher was
so incautious as
to mention his
eyes, if one of
a hundred faults
was committed
and the fishing
was in vain,
then the fisher
acknowledged his
ill success
abjectly by
saying that (maloā)
he was
conquered. Such
is the language
Samoans use to
the gentleman of
the seas, and he
is not
i'a
...
|
After 13 days counted from the beginning of
the new year (i.e. 3 days after 11 February) came the transformation to
the war-god
Kuu.
...
In many Polynesian cultures the bodies of
gods were conceived of as covered with
feathers and they were frequently associated
with birds: in Tahiti and the Society
Islands, bird calls on the marae
signaled the presence of the gods. Hawaiian
feathered god figures generally depict only
the head and neck of the god ...
Day 45 (= 31 + 14) counted from January 1 was February
14 (2-14), and 354 + 45 = 399 (or counting
also day zero: 400).
... Taw,
Tav or Taf is the
twenty-second and last letter in many
Semitic abjads ... In gematria Tav
represents the number 400, the largest
single number that can be represented
without using the Sophit forms ...
... Lau,
s. Haw., to feel for, spread out,
expand, be broad, numerous; s. leaf
of a tree or plant, expanse, place where
people dwell, the end, point; sc. extension
of a thing; the number four hundred ...
... Murzim
[β Canis Majoris], generally
but less correctly Mirzam, and occasionally
Mirza, is from Al Murzim, the
Announcer², often combined by the Arabs with
β
Canis Minoris in the plural Al Mirzamāni,
or as Al Mirzamā al Shi'rayain,
the two Sirian Announcers; Ideler's idea of
the applicability of this title being that
this star announced the immediate rising of
the still brighter Sirius.
² Literally the Roarer, and so another of
the many words in the Arabic tongue for the
lion, of which that people boasted of having
four hundred ...
... The Sacred Book of the ancient Maya
Quiche, the famous Popol Vuh (the
Book of Counsel) tells of Zipacna, son of
Vucub-Caquix (= Seven Arata). He sees 400
youths dragging a huge log that they want as
a ridgepole for their house. Zipacna alone
carries the tree without effort to the spot
where a hole has been dug for the post to
support the ridgepole. The youths, jealous
and afraid, try to kill Zipacna by crushing
him in the hole, but he escapes and brings
down the house on their heads. They are
removed to the sky, in a 'group', and the
Pleiades are called after them
...
There was a connection between the youths in
the Pleiades and a cycle of 400.
... The word lau, in
the sense of expanse, and hence 'the sea,
ocean', is not now used in the Polynesian
dialects. There remain, however, two
compound forms to indicate its former use in
that sense: lau-make, Haw., lit. the
abating or subsiding of water, i.e.,
drought; rau-mate, Tah., to cease
from rain, be fair weather; rau-mate,
N. Zeal., id., hence summer .The
other word is koo-lau, Haw.,
kona-rau, N. Zeal., toe-rau,
Tah., on the side of the great ocean, the
weather side of an island or group;
toa-lau, Sam., the north-east trade
wind. In Fiji, lau is the name of the
windward islands generally. In the Malay and
pre-Malay dialects that word in that sense
still remains under various forms: laut,
lauti, lautan, lauhaha,
olat, wolat, medi-laut,
all signifying the sea, on the same
principle of derivation as the Latin
æquor,
flat, level, expanse, the sea
...
... In the description of the Babylonian
zodiac given in the clay tablets known as
the MUL.APIN, the constellation now known as
Aries was the final station along the
ecliptic. It was known as MULLÚ.ḪUN.GÁ,
'The Agrarian Worker'.
The MUL.APIN is held to have been compiled
in the 12th or 11th century BCE, but it
reflects a tradition which takes the
Pleiades as marking vernal equinox, which
was the case with some precision at the
beginning of the Middle Bronze Age (early
3rd millennium BCE) ...
... One of the youths said to Ira,
'Why do we want heaps of stone?' Ira
replied, 'So that we can all ask the stones
to do something.' They took (the material)
for the stone heaps (pipi horeko) and
piled up six heaps of stone at the outer
edge of the cave. Then they all said to the
stone heaps, 'Whenever he calls, whenever he
calls for us, let your voices rush (to him)
instead of the six (of us) (i.e., the six
stone heaps are supposed to be substitutes
for the youths). They all drew back to
profit (from the deception) (? ki honui)
and listened. A short while later, Kuukuu
called. As soon as he had asked, 'Where are
you?' the voices of the stone heaps replied,
'Here we are!' All (the youths) said, 'Hey,
you! That was well done!'
...
... another Alcyone, daughter of Pleione,
'Queen of Sailing', by the oak-hero Atlas,
was the mystical leader of the seven
Pleiads. The heliacal rising of the Pleiads
in May marked the beginning of the
navigational year; their setting marked its
end when (as Pliny notices in a passage
about the halcyon) a remarkably cold North
wind blows
...
... Pliny, who carefully describes the
halcyon's alleged nest - apparently the
zoöphyte called halcyoneum by
Linnaeus - reports that the halcyon is
rarely seen and then only at the winter and
summer solstices and at the setting of the
Pleiades. This proves her to have originally
been a manifestation of the Moon-goddess who
was worshipped at the two solstices as the
Goddess of alternatively Life-in-Death and
Death-in-Life - and who early in November,
when the Pleiades set, sent the sacred king
his summons to death
...
... The Mahabharata insists on six
as the number of the Pleiades [at the time
of rongorongo the triplet Alcyone, Pleione,
and Atlas were rising with the Sun in right
ascension day *56 and 6 * 56 = 336 = 365 -
29] as well as of
the mothers of Skanda and gives a
very broad and wild description of the birth
and the installation of Kartikeya 'by
the assembled gods ... as their
generalissimo', which is shattering,
somehow, driving home how little one
understands as yet. The least which can be
said, assuredly: Mars was 'installed' during
a more or less close conjunction of all
planets; in Mbh. 9.45 (p. 133) it is
stressed that the powerful gods assembled
'all poured water upon Skanda, even
as the gods had poured water on the head of
Varuna, the lord of waters, for
investing him with dominion'. And this
'investiture' took place at the beginning of
the Krita Yuga, the Golden Age
...
400 - 214 = 186, although there were
evidently 4 special days not to be counted,
because 214 + 182 = 396:
|
Counting the tresses of
Pachamama (the World Mother)
from right to left: |
|
1 |
26 |
78 |
1 |
29 |
90 |
|
2 |
26 |
2 |
30 |
|
3 |
26 |
3 |
31 |
|
4 |
25 |
104 |
4 |
34 |
124 |
|
5 |
26 |
5 |
31 |
|
6 |
27 |
6 |
30 |
|
7 |
26 |
7 |
29 |
|
Total = 396 = 182 + 214 |
|