Rongorongo-Indus Scripts & neural networks. A search for meaning endowed in Ahu ritual platforms of Moai. Living archaeology of Rapa Nui (Easter Island) (original) (raw)

This is an addendum to: Corpus of Rongorongo texts and a compendium of views on links with Indus Script https://tinyurl.com/y8nzcmsk Moai, Ahu, Hotu are evocative words which enthrall a researcher into the human condition wonder how a group of human beings express themselves through 'sculptures' and 'hieroglyphs'. We do not know what the words mean. Could these words be remembered phonemes from antiquity, lost in the mists of time? Maybe, neuroscience researches related to sensory perceptions of vision and hearing -- e.g., 'documenting' meanings by linking 'images' and 'sounds' in the brain neural networks may provide some leads. There are cognate words in ancient languages of India, for e.g. म a magic formula; N. of various gods (of ब्रह्मा , विष्णु , शिव , and यम) मा to measure out , apportion , grant RV. ; to help any one (acc.) to anything (dat.) ib. , i , 120 , 9 ; to prepare , arrange , fashion , form , build , make RV. ; to show , display , exhibit (अमिमीत , " he displayed or developed himself " , iii , 29 , 11) ib. ; to be measured &c RV. &c &c Caus. , मापयति , °ते (aor. अमीमपत् Pa1n2. 7-4 , 93 Va1rtt. 2 Pat. ) , to cause to be measured or built , measure , build , erect Up. Gr2S.MBh. &c : Desid. मित्सति , °ते Pa1n2. 7-4 , 54 ; 58 (cf. निर्- √मा): Intens. मेमीयते Pa1n2. 6-4 , 66. [cf. Zd. ma1 ; Lat. me1tior , mensus , mensura ; Slav. me8ra ; Lith. me3ra4.] hotr̥ होतृ m. (fr. √1. हु) an offerer of an oblation or burnt-offering (with fire) , sacrificer , priest , (esp.) a priest who at a sacrifice invokes the gods or recites the ऋग्-वेद , a ऋग्-वेद priest (one of the 4 kinds of officiating priest » ऋत्विज् , p.224; properly the होतृ priest has 3 assistants , sometimes called पुरुषs , viz. the मैत्रा-वरुण , अच्छा-वाक , and ग्रावस्तुत् ; to these are sometimes added three others , the ब्राह्मणाच्छंसिन् , अग्नीध्र or अग्नीध् , and पोतृ , though these last are properly assigned to the Brahman priest ; sometimes the नेष्टृ is substituted for the ग्राव-स्तुत्) RV. &c. आ- √ हु P. A1. -जुहोति , -जुहुते (p. -ज्/उह्वान) to sacrifice , offer an oblation ; to sprinkle (with butter) RV. AV. TS. Hariv. (Monier-Williams) S. Kalyanaraman, Sarasvati Research Centre Manchester Museum had an exhibition which provides a way to organize and recreate the ancient lives of Moai. See photographs of 2015 exhibition. "Almost a year after it was first mooted and after six months’ hard work Making Monuments on Rapa Nui the Statues from Easter Island opened with a Private View on Tuesday evening. About 300 people attended the official opening to hear speeches from Dr Nick Merriman, Director of Manchester Museum, Prof Colin Richards, from the Department of Archaeology, and Mathias Francke, Chilean Deputy Ambassador, and to see the exhibition for the first time." https://ancientworldsmanchester.wordpress.com/tag/pukao/ " Abstract. This article explores the spatial, architectural and conceptual relationships between landscape places, stone quarrying, and stone moving and building during Rapa Nui’s statue-building period. These are central themes of the ‘Rapa Nui Landscapes of Construction Project’ and are discussed using aspects of the findings of our recent fieldwork. The different scales of expression, from the detail of the domestic sphere to the monumental working of quarries, are considered. It is suggested that the impressiveness of Rapa Nui’s stone architecture is its conceptual coherence at the small scale as much as at the large scale. How to Cite: Hamilton, S., (2013). Rapa Nui (Easter Island)’s Stone Worlds. Archaeology International. 16, pp.96–109. DOI: http://doi.org/10.5334/ai.1613" https://www.ai-journal.com/articles/10.5334/ai.1613/ (UCL Inst. of Archaeogy, Article by Sue Hamilton of 24 October 2013, embedded for ready reference) Ahu are stone platforms...Of the 313 known ahu, 125 carried moai... Ahu Tongariki, one kilometre (0.62 miles) from Rano Raraku, had the most and tallest moai, 15 in total...A paved plaza before the ahu. This was called marae...When a ceremony took place, "eyes" were placed on the statues. The whites of the eyes were made of coral, the iris was made of obsidian or red scoria. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Easter\_Island#Stone\_platforms Legend of Hotu Matua Hotu Matu'a was the legendary first settler and ariki mau ("supreme chief" or "king") of Easter Island. Hotu Matu'a and his two canoe (or one double hulled canoe) colonising party were Polynesians from the now unknown land of Hiva (probably the Marquesas). They landed at Anakena beach and his people spread out across the island, sub-divided it between clans claiming descent from his sons, and lived for more than a thousand years in their isolated island home at the southeastern tip of the Polynesian Triangle. Polynesians first came to Rapa Nui/Easter Island sometime between 300 CE and 800 CE. These are the common elements of oral history that have been extracted from island legends. Linguistic, DNA and Pollen analysis all point to a Polynesian first settlement of the island at that time, but it is unlikely that other details can be verified. During this era the Polynesians were colonizing islands across a vast expanse of the Pacific Ocean. Hotu Matua led his people from Hiva; linguistic analysis comparing Rapanui to other Polynesian languages suggests this was the Marquesas Islands. It is said that Hau-Maka had a dream in which his spirit travelled to a far country, to help look for new land for King Hotu Matu'a. In the dream, his spirit travelled to the Mata ki te Rangi (Eyes that look to the Sky). The island has also been called "Te Pito 'o te Kainga", which means "the Center of the Earth." Both islands are commonly said to be Easter Island. When Hau-Maka woke, he told the King. The King then ordered seven men to travel to the island from Hiva (a mythical land) to investigate. After they found the land, they returned to Hiva. The King and many more travelled to this new island. Rapa Nui Mythology The Easter Island Statue Project There are only 21 known tablets in existence, scattered in museums and private collections. Tiny, remarkably regular glyphs, about one centimeter high, highly stylized and formalized, are carved in shallow grooves running the length of the tablets. Oral tradition has it that scribes used obsidian flakes or shark teeth to cut the glyphs and that writing was brought by the first colonists led by Hotu Matua. Last but not least, of the twenty-one surviving tablets three bear the same text in slightly different "spellings", a fact discovered by three schoolboys of St Petersburg (then Leningrad), just before World War II. In 1868 newly converted Easter Islanders send to Tepano Jaussen, Bishop of Tahiti, as a token of respect, a long twine of human hair, wound around an ancient piece of wood. Tepano Jaussen examines the gift, and, lifting the twine, discovers that the small board is covered in hieroglyphs. The bishop, elated at the discovery, writes to Father Hippolyte Roussel on Easter Island, exhorting him to gather all the tablets he can and to seek out natives able to translate them. But only a handful remain of the hundreds of tablets mentioned by Brother Eyraud only a few years earlier in a report to the Father Superior of the Congregation of the Sacred Heart. Some say they were burnt to please the missionaries who saw in them evil relics of pagan times. Some say they were hidden to save them from destruction. Which side should we believe? Brother Eyraud had died in 1868 without having ever mentioned the tablets to anyone else, not even to his friend Father Zumbohm, who is astounded at the bishop's discovery. Monsignor Jaussen soon locates in Tahiti a laborer from Easter Island, Metoro, who claims to be able to read the tablets. He describes in his notes how Metoro turns each tablet around and around to find its beginning, then starts chanting its contents. The direction of writing is unique. Starting from the left-hand bottom corner, you proceed from left to right and, at the end of the line, you turn the tablet around before you start reading the next line. Indeed, the orientation of the hieroglyphs is reversed every other line. Imagine a book in which every other line is printed back-to-front and upside-down. That is how the tablets are written! Jaussen was not able to decipher the tablets. There are also many zoomorphic figures, birds especially, fish and lizards less often. The most frequent figure looks very much like the frigate bird, which happens to have been the object of a cult, as it was associated with Make-Make, the supreme god. When you compare the tablets which bear the same text, when you analyze repeated groups of signs, you realize that writing must have followed rules. The scribe could choose to link a sign to the next, but not in any old way. You could either carve a mannikin standing, arms dangling, followed by some other sign, or the same mannikin holding that sign with one hand. You could either carve a simple sign (a leg, a crescent) separate from the next, or rotate it 90 degrees counterclockwise and carve the next sign on top of it. All we can reasonably hope to decipher some day is some two to three lines of the tablet commonly called Mamari. You can clearly see that they have to do with the moon. There are several versions of the ancient lunar calendar of Easter Island.