TRANSLATIONS

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There was a conflict between king Hotu A Matua and Oroi, and I presume that we may compare Oroi with Tezcatlipoca, the dark opponent. Barthel 2:

"... ['there is the possibility that the beginning of this text is missing'] At the moment when (Rovi?) reached Motu O Roro (an islet off the northern shore, east of Anakena), there were six children lying with their faces down (i.e., on their stomachs); six youths were warming themselves in the sun after a lot of diving.

Rovi asked, 'Will you get up, fellows?' But not one arose, not one got up.

He went and (wanted to) wake them up, when he suddenly saw that the six children had been killed. Rovi looked closely (to see) how they had died. Suddenly he saw that the end of the intestine was protruding from the rectum and was actually hanging out.

He loudly screamed the following toward the land: 'Hahaki A Roro and his (brothers) Manu Kena A Roro, Te Paripari A Roro, Kai Tanoa A Roro, Eve Pipiro I Te Hiku Kio A Roro, and Aro Nehehehe O Roro, are corpses.

They have been killed by having their intestines torn out, you (people) on land!'

Then the servant (tuura) of the king (i.e., Rovi) quickly ran toward the land, came ashore, and brought the news to King Matua. He arrived and told King Hotu about the dead. He came and reported the following: 'Hahaki A Roro and his brothers are corpses - all six have been killed.'

King Hotu said to Roro, 'Go and bring the corpses of the young men, which are on the islet, on Motu O Roro! Rovi, the servant of Tuu Maheke [??], has spoken (of them).'

Roro went out with his young kinsmen, ten in all. They got there, jumped across (the water), and climbed up on the islet. They arrived and picked up the corpses and returned (again) to the land. They went ashore, picked up the dead, moved on, and arrived in front of the house. (There) they left (the dead).

10 young kinsmen sounds like the 10 solar months - in the beginning of the story 6 children were lying with their faces down (of course meaning death) at the edge of the water.

King Hotu arrived and asked, 'How were these young men killed?' The voices of the protective spirits (atua akuaku) of Hotu, namely Kuihi and Kuaha, replied, 'Oroi introduced the long, sharp antennae of the spiny lobster (vaero ura) (into the orifice) and then pulled out the intestines completely and left them hanging (out). This is how the victims (ika) were killed.' ..."

At the edge of the water (close to the horizon), the adversary, Mercury, the god of intestines, rules.

'... tonight, as soon as darkness draws over the sea and the fires of the volcano goddess, Pele, light the clouds over the crater of Mount Kilauea, the black cloth will cover my head.

And when the breath has gone from my body and my spirit has departed to the realms of the dead, you are to bury my head carefully near our spring of running water. Plant my heart and entrails near the door of the house ...'

Let us repeat some facts about Mercury and his intestines:

Kokoma

Intestines, guts. Vanaga.

Bowels, entrails, intestines, rectum, garbage, rage, angry; kokoma hanohano, spite, to despise, to hate, to storm, to bear a grudge, vexation; kokoma hanohano ke, to be in a rage; kokoma hakahanohano, to excite anger; kokoma hanohano manava pohi, to abhor; kokoma ritarita, to abhor; kokoma eete, to abhor, to detest, to be in a rage, angry, ungovernable; tagata kokoma eete, adversary; kokoma hurihuri, animosity, spite, wrath, fury, hate, enmity, to pester, to resent, irritable, offended, hot tempered; kokoma hurihuri ke, to be in a rage. Churchill.

Hawaiian Islands

Society Islands

Tuamotus

New Zealand

Pukapuka

Ukali or Ukali-alii 'Following-the-chief' (i.e. the Sun)

Kawela 'Radiant'

Ta'ero or Ta'ero-arii 'Royal-inebriate' (referring to the eccentric and undignified behavior of the planet as it zigzags from one side of the Sun to the other)

Fatu-ngarue 'Weave-to-and-fro'

Fatu-nga-rue 'Lord of the Earthquake'

Whiro 'Steals-off-and-hides'; also the universal name for the 'dark of the Moon' or the first day of the lunar month; also the deity of sneak thieves and rascals.

Te Mata-pili-loa-ki-te-la 'Star-very-close-to-the-Sun'

The 'dark of the Moon', Mercury and the first day of the lunar month, Whiro in New Zealand (Ohiro on Easter Island) was the deity of 'sneak thieves and rascals', dark characteristics:

Hiro

1. A deity invoked when praying for rain (meaning uncertain). 2. To twine tree fibres (hauhau, mahute) into strings or ropes. Vanaga.

To spin, to twist. P Mgv.: hiro, iro, to make a cord or line in the native manner by twisting on the thigh. Mq.: fió, hió, to spin, to twist, to twine. Ta.: hiro, to twist. This differs essentially from the in-and-out movement involved in hiri 2, for here the movement is that of rolling on the axis of length, the result is that of spinning. Starting with the coir fiber, the first operation is to roll (hiro) by the palm of the hand upon the thigh, which lies coveniently exposed in the crosslegged sedentary posture, two or three threads into a cord; next to plait (hiri) three or other odd number of such cords into sennit. Hirohiro, to mix, to blend, to dissolve, to infuse, to inject, to season, to streak with several colors; hirohiro ei paatai, to salt. Hirohiroa, to mingle; hirohiroa ei vai, diluted with water. Churchill.

To 'streak with several colors' (hirohiro) - as in a rainbow - may be the result of 'twisting on the thigh', i.e. 'rolling on the axis of length', cfr this picture from Lockyer:

"... Then Hotu started lamenting (tangi) the death of Hahaki A Roro and his brothers with these words:

tute nui no mai koe You alone have continued the great persecution,
e Oroi e oh Oroi,
mai hiva mai te kainga from Hiva, from the (home)land,
o kau a koro so that the father (?) would not achieve greatness.
au e aku poki Woe my children (?)!
pei nui o te hakarava e Greit pei fish of Te Hakarava!
ura nui o te mana vai Great lobster of Te Manavai!
koiro nui o te mana vai Great moray of Te Manavai!
koreha nui o tea vai aro huri Great eel of Tea Vai Aro Huri!'

We recall the eskimo story of the 'entrail snatcher':

'... Then she sat down on the sleeping platform and for the time being remained sitting there. At the front wall of the house she caught sight of some poor human beings, their faces were one broad grin - they had no entrails. Thus she now sat there. At last, after some time, the Moon entered, and he now said: 'Look at those poor fellows there without entrails, they are those my cousin has deprived of their entrails!'

He had given one of them something to chew, but as usual it fell down through him, where the entrails had been removed. Whenever they swallowed something, they had chewed a little, it fell right through them.

The Moon now said to her: 'Look here! My poor cousin, the entrail-snatcher, he will surely come in to take away thy entrails, but now listen how to act. Thou must begin to blow and at the same time to thrust thy hands in under the front flap of thy fur coat, holding them so that they resemble a bear, then he must take himself off. Do thus, whenever thou art on the point of smiling!' Thus he told her to act.

Finally, at one time, he could really be heard to enter to them, he, the poor cousin of the Moon, the entrail-snatcher, carrying a dish and a large knife, in order to try to snatch the entrails of the human being. And look! At the window his wife stood and kept on saying: 'She smiles!'

The entrail-snatcher began to dance a drum dance, with ridiculous movements, and they only looked at him, while he sang: My little dogs, I get them food, / My little dogs, I get them food, / ha-ahing, ha-ahing, ha-ahing.

While he acted thus, his poor wife all along stood at the window saying: 'She smiles, she smiles, she smiles!' She was tremendously busy telling her husband that she smiled. At last she could hardly let be smiling when looking at him, but she placed her hands under the front part of her fur coat and blew violently, as the Moon had told her to do.

And indeed he took himself off, the entrail-snatcher, over there, saying: 'One with blubber (i.e., a bear) is heard!' Then he disappeared, and the Moon took his dish and flung it violently into the window platform. There it now lay, while the entrail-snatcher took himself off. When he had taken himself off, it did not last long before he attempted to send for it. 'His dish, it is said, can he have it?'

'He may fetch it himself', said the Moon. 'Let him fetch it himself!' 'His dish, it is said!' Thus they continued for a long time. But when the Moon only kept on saying that he himself should fetch it, then the other one said at last: 'The entrail-snatcher is going to overturn the great mountain, it is said!'

But the Moon only answered: 'All right, let him overturn it!' And indeed the other answered: 'All right, it is said, let them only look on!' The great Moon went outside, and there the entrail-snatcher sat, facing the mountain and beginning to move his feet.

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 stem kau does not appear independently in any language of Polynesian proper. For tree and for timber we have the composite lakau in various stages of transformation. But kau will also be found as an initial component of various tree names. It is in Viti that we first find it in free existence. In Melanesia this form is rare. It occurs as kau in Efaté, Sesake, Epi, Nguna, and perhaps may be preserved in Aneityum; as gau in Marina; as au in Motu and somewhere in the Solomon islands. The triplicity of the Efaté forms [kasu, kas, kau] suggests a possible transition. Kasu and kas are easy to be correlated, kasu and kau less easy. They might be linked by the assumption of a parent form kahu, from which each might derive. This would appear in modern Samoan as kau; but I have found it the rule that even the mildest aspirate in Proto-Samoan becoming extinct in modern Samoan is yet retained as aspiration in Nuclear Polynesia and as th in Viti, none of which mutations is found on this record. Churchill 2
Kaukau

1. Horizontal poles of a frame (of a hare paega, or a paina statue): he-hakatu'u te tama o te paina, he-kaukau, they erect the vertical poles of the paina then they lay upon them the horizontal ones. 2. Group of people: e-tahi tuitui reipá i Te Pei, ekó rava'a e-varu kaukau; i-garo ai i Hiva, i te kaiga, a necklace of mother-of-pearl is on te Pei, few will find it (lit: eight groups of people); it has remained in Hiva, in our homeland. 3. To go through, to pass through in unison; he-hogi-mai te űka i te e'eo o te pua kaukau-á i roto ite hare, the girl smelt the fragrance of the pua wafting inside the house. 4. Newborn baby's first hand and feet movements (kaukau or kau). The five stages of a baby's development are: kaukau, puepe, tahuri, totoro, mahaga. Puepue = said of a newborn baby when, a few weeks old, it begins to distinguish people and objects: ku-puepue-á te poki. Tahuri = of a new-born baby, to move from side to side: ku-tahuri-á te poki. Totoro = to crawl; ki totoro te poki, when the baby crawls. Mahaga = baby when able to stand by itself. Vanaga.

The large mountain indeed began to move a little. 'Give it him, give it him!' the Moon said at last. 'Give it him, give it him.' Finally he gave it him, and then the entrail-snatcher took himself off for home ...'

The large mountain which moved a little may mean that the axis of the earth declines a bit. It may be a coincidence, but anyhow: Ab1-35 and Ab1-40 (red-marked below) at the beginning of the (presumably) dark side b of Tahua are leaning a little:

Ab1-35 and Ab1-40 are thin (maybe meaning little light).
Ab1-21 Ab1-22 Ab1-23 Ab1-24 Ab1-25 Ab1-26 Ab1-27
Ab1-28 Ab1-29 Ab1-30
Ab1-31 Ab1-32 Ab1-33 Ab1-34 Ab1-35 Ab1-36 Ab1-37
Ab1-38 Ab1-39 Ab1-40 Ab1-41 Ab1-42 Ab1-43