Coconut pollen found on remote Hawaiian islands

Coconut pollen found on Laysan

By Jan TenBruggencate

Honolulu Advertiser Science Writer


Archaeologist Stephen Athens has found coconut pollen deep in the sediments of the salt lake on Laysan Island in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands — an unexpected find that has excited the Hawai'i scientific and cultural communities.

One plant, numerous uses

Cocos nucifera is known in Hawaiian as niu.

The coconut is the classic tree of Polynesia, and one of the most important plants to residents of the islands. It grows in brackish to near full-salty conditions. The wood of very old trees is quite hard and has been used for flooring. Its fronds can be used for thatching and weaving. The fibrous husk around the nut can be twisted and braided into cordage, called sennit. The hard shell of the seed makes containers and can be shaped into implements and buttons. Inside the seed is fresh drinking liquid, even on the smallest islands where no fresh water is available. The meat of the seed can be eaten, dried, or scraped and pressed to generate a fat-rich milk. The dried coconut meat, called copra, can be pressed for oil that can be used as a skin lotion, for soap-making and in cooking.


Sources: "A Tropical Garden Flora," "La'au Hawai'i: Traditional Hawaiian Uses of Plants"

If the coconut got to remote Laysan — 930 miles northwest of Honolulu — on its own, it is the first evidence coconuts ever made it to Hawai'i without human help.


If Hawaiians brought it, it is the first physical evidence that Hawaiians ventured that far up the archipelago. The only archaeological evidence of Polynesian visits to what some


call the Kupuna Islands is stonework and artifacts found on the nearest ones — Nihoa and Necker, or Mokumanamana, the latter 460 miles northwest of Honolulu.


"It is fascinating. I wonder how they got there," said Hawai'i botanist Derral Herbst, co-author of a new book about the plants cultivated in the Islands, "A Tropical Garden Flora."


Athens said he is sure the coconut pollen was deposited sometime between 5,500 years ago and the time of the first European visits to the Islands — but because of the quality of the sediment, he can't date it for certain more closely than that.


"It is so deep that it seems that it could be a natural introduction, but it is plausible they were planted," Athens said.


Either alternative is big news in the scientific world. Athens has not yet published the report in a scientific journal, but his findings are in a report to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, entitled "Holocene Paleoenvironment of Laysan Island."


Athens did his work under contract with the Fish and Wildlife Service, which hopes to revegetate Laysan with the native plants present before Western contact, when firewood harvesting, guano collection, the introduction of rabbits and other activities denuded the place.


Laysan is roughly rectangular in shape, less than two miles long and just a mile wide. A large depression in its center contains a super-salty lake. Since water can preserve pollen, Athens hoped to find clues to the former vegetation in the sediment layers at the lake's bottom.


In the summer of 2003, he plunged a coring device into the sediment, which continued down for 70 feet before it hit rock. The cores were studied by Jerome Ward, a palynologist, or pollen expert, who also found that ancient Laysan had a dense forest of Pritchardia palms, or loulu; 'ilima bushes; an unidentified hibiscus; and an aquatic plant whose presence proved that Laysan's lake was once brackish.


The first botanical survey of the island in the late 1800s found, among other plants, sandalwood, a few remnant loulu, sedges and clumping grasses, as well as a fragrant, night-blooming shrub known in Hawai'i as maiapilo. But no coconuts.


Athens said the oldest part of the core, dating as far back as 7,000 years ago, does not have coconut pollen, suggesting the species had not yet arrived there that early. He said the previous work done by him and other researchers show that coconuts were moving into the Pacific during that period. Pollen samples on Guam have found coconuts were there long before humans — as early as 9,000 years ago.


University of Hawai'i archaeologist Terry Hunt said that work in the Cook Islands found evidence that coconuts were present there before humans were, as well.


"These findings are consistent with their (coconuts') biology," Hunt said.


Coconuts are uniquely suited to survive for a period of time on the ocean. University of Hawai'i ethnobotanist Isabella Abbott said she can recall finding sprouting coconuts washing ashore in Hawai'i when she was a child. And her book, "La'au Hawai'i: Traditional Hawaiian Uses of Plants," cites research that coconuts could still sprout after being in salt water for as long as four months.


Laysan has a small grove of coconuts now, which was planted in the modern age. Athens said the uppermost — therefore most recent — parts of the lakebed core sample contain pollen believed to be from these trees.


"This is an interesting natural history phenomenon," said Sheila Conant, a University of Hawai'i biologist who has studied extensively on Laysan and other Northwestern Hawaiian islands. "My first thought was that when we're doing restoration, now, we can leave those coconut trees."


But if early Hawaiians were voyaging between the distant islands northwest of Kaua'i and O'ahu, it is likely they could have been a source for the coconut. Cultural historian Kepa Maly said his conversations with


Ni'ihau elders found that they recalled discussions in which coconuts were named among the items brought on long voyages.


"It seems logical that if kanaka had traveled there, they would have carried coconuts with them," Maly said.


He said that there is plenty of evidence in chants and traditions that Hawaiians knew about the multiple islands beyond the main Hawaiian islands. Maly, in fact, suggests that Necker Island, also known as Mokumanamana, may be misnamed. Some old sources use the term Namokumanamana, which may be translated "the fragmented pinnacle islands," and Namoku'aha, or "the line of islands."


These may be terms that show that early Hawaiians knew the many islands beyond Kaua'i and Ni'ihau.


"There is a good enough body of native tradition of traveling to those islands," Maly said.


Athens said he would like to do additional core samples in Laysan's lake to try to better tie down the dates when coconuts were present. He said he would also like to do core samples at the neighboring island, Lisianski. Lisianski had a lake like Laysan's, but when rabbits ate all the island's vegetation in the first decades of the 1900s, the resulting sand storms filled it. It could tell whether there once were coconuts on that island as well.


Botanist and Hawaiian cultural expert Sam Gon III said that whether the coconuts got deep into the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands naturally or were brought by Hawaiians, the finding from a scientific point of view is "a fun, exciting thing." He further muddied the theory on the pollen's origins by suggesting still another alternative route for the tree — that early Polynesians could have brought them to the main Hawaiian Islands, and that they drifted on their own from there to Laysan.


Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

News: Early humans out of Africa via the coast

Here are some abstracts of articles from Science journal on southern coastal migrations out of Africa.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento
---

Single, Rapid Coastal Settlement of Asia Revealed by Analysis of
Complete Mitochondrial Genomes

Vincent Macaulay, Catherine Hill, Alessandro Achilli, Chiara Rengo,
Douglas Clarke, William Meehan, James Blackburn, Ornella Semino,
Rosaria Scozzari, Fulvio Cruciani, Adi Taha, Norazila Kassim
Shaari, Joseph Maripa Raja, Patimah Ismail, Zafarina Zainuddin,
William Goodwin, David Bulbeck, Hans-Jurgen Bandelt,
Stephen Oppenheimer, Antonio Torroni, and Martin Richards

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/308/5724/1034?etoc
p. 1034

A recent dispersal of modern humans out of Africa is now widely
accepted, but the routes taken across Eurasia are still disputed. We
show that mitochondrial DNA variation in isolated "relict"
populations in southeast Asia supports the view that there was only
a single dispersal from Africa, most likely via a southern coastal
route, through India and onward into southeast Asia and Australasia.
There was an early offshoot, leading ultimately to the settlement of
the Near East and Europe, but the main dispersal from India to
Australia 65,000 years ago was rapid, most likely taking only a few
thousand years.


http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/308/5724/996?etoc
p. 996


Reconstructing the Origin of Andaman Islanders
Kumarasamy Thangaraj,1 Gyaneshwer Chaubey,1 Toomas Kivisild,2 Alla G.
Reddy,1 Vijay Kumar Singh,1 Avinash A. Rasalkar,1 Lalji Singh1*

The origin of the Andaman "Negrito" and Nicobar "Mongoloid"
populations has been ambiguous. Our analyses of complete
mitochondrial DNA sequences from Onges and Great Andaman populations
revealed two deeply branching clades that share their most recent
common ancestor in founder haplogroup M, with lineages spread among
India, Africa, East Asia, New Guinea, and Australia. This
distribution suggests that these two clades have likely survived in
genetic isolation since the initial settlement of the islands during
an out-of-Africa migration by anatomically modern humans. In
contrast, Nicobarese sequences illustrate a close genetic
relationship with populations from Southeast Asia.


EVOLUTION:
Enhanced: Did Early Humans Go North or South?
Peter Forster and Shuichi Matsumura

When the first early humans ventured out of Africa, which way did
they go? Studies of maternally inherited mitochondrial DNA are
revealing the excursion choices of our earliest ancestors. In their
Perspective, Forster and Matsumura discuss two new studies of the
mitochondrial DNA of the indigenous peoples of Malaysia and the
Andaman islands (Macaulay et al., Thangaraj et al.). These studies
suggest that the earliest humans took a southern route along the
coastline of the Indian Ocean before fanning out over the rest of
the world.

Glossary: Motif -- Buffalo horns

Legendary Chinese history describes Chiyou one of the earliest "barbarian" kings opposed to the Xia peoples as having bull's horns. These can and have been interpreted as water buffalo horns. Shennong, an ally of Chiyou thought by some to be the same as the king known as Yandi, also is said to have had a bovine head. The Shennong statue at the Jiaxiang Temple in Shandong has buffalo horns.

These buffalo horns are changed to a crown in other depictions of Shennong.

There is physical evidence of domesticated water buffalo going back to the Middle and possibly Early Neolithic. Some experts have reconstructed a Proto-Austronesian word for domesticated water buffalo.

From the Chinese texts and iconography it may be surmised that water buffalo horns represented royal power to the barbarian coastal peoples of East and South China before the Xia Dynasty.

Buffalo skulls have been found in human settlements dating back to the Early Neolithic. The use of buffalo skulls as symbols of power, royalty and divinity is widespread throughout Southeast Asia.

The buffalo sacrifice is important in many Southeast Asian cultures in royal and chiefly ritual, and in funerary rites. The buffalo and horse are commonly viewed as animals that carry the dead to the afterlife.

Buffalo horns appear widely as motifs in many ancient cultures. At times, buffalo horns seem interchangeable with the inverted crescent Moon motif. In ancient Sumer, for example, the crescent Moon was associated with the god Nanna-Suen who is often described as a bull.



A symbol of the Sun, a star or rosette surrounded by buffalo horns or a crescent is a common variation of this motif. In Sumer, the eight-pointed star in the crescent could stand for Inanna-Ishtar, associated with the planet Venus, and also possibly at the same time her twin brother, Utu the Sun God. Both Inanna and Utu were children of Nanna-Suen, whose symbol again is the crescent Moon.

In the Bronze Age Aegean, the double axe appears between buffalo horns in images of the bee goddess. The double axe is often seen as a symbol of thunder and lightning, which in turn could symbolize the descent of deified planets/stars.



In the Harappan civilization of India, a buffalo-horned "Proto-Siva" image appears in an apparent "Lord of the Beasts" motif indicating both the divine and royal status of the god. Likewise, in Sumerian and Akkadian culture, gods are often shown with miniature crescentic bovine horns, in one or more pairs mounted on pointed caps. These horns could be meant to portray those of the buffalo, and are a special symbol of divinity.

"Lord of the Beasts" from Harappa

In Sumerian and Akkadian city-states where the king was granted divine status he also was portrayed with horned crowns. In some cases, temple prostitutes acted as manifestations of Inanna in the annual "divine marriage" with the king ritual.

Clay sealing from private collection with water buffalo, crescent-star, apparently Akkadian period

The crescent form of the horns appears to come directly from the swamp buffalo, which like the river buffalo was domesticated in tropical Asia. The swamp buffalo's range is more eastern than the river buffalo.

According to this work, buffalo horns could be originally a totemic ancestor symbol related to alliances between the Nusantao lineage of Tala (traditionalist) with non-Xia peoples of eastern and southern China around 3000 BCE.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

References

Brighenti, Francesco. Buffalo Sacrifice and Tribal Mortuary Rituals, http://www.svabhinava.org/friends/FrancescoBrighenti/BuffaloSacrifice-frame.html

Maxwell, Gavin (with Bonnie Gustav). "Water Buffalo and Garbage Pits: Ethnoarchaeology at al-Hiba." Bulletin on Sumerian Agriculture 8:1-9, 1995.

Ochsenschlager, Edward and Bonnie Gustav, Ethnographic evidence for Water buffalo and the disposal of animal bones in Southern Iraq: Ethnoarchaeology at Al-Hiba. Domestic Animals of Mesopotamia Part II. Bulletin on Sumerian Agriculture Vol. III. pages 1-9, 1995.

News: Out of Africa and straight to the beach

This news article is of interest because it confirms earlier studies suggesting humans coming out of Africa hugged the seacoast and acquired much of their food from the sea.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento
---

http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn7371&feedId=online-news_rss20

Out of Africa and straight to the beach

Modern humans emerged just once out of Africa - and headed straight for the beach - new genetic research suggests.

Most scientists agree that modern humans left Africa relatively recently, and it was traditionally thought that the route taken was northwards, overland into the Middle East and beyond.

But by measuring genetic variation in an isolated population in southeast Asia, Vincent Macaulay at the University of Glasgow, UK, and a team of international colleagues, conclude that the dispersal actually took a southern coastal route.

“It looks likely that a founder population crossed the Red Sea, and spread to Australia via India and southeast Asia, taking a southern route along the coast,” says Macaulay.
Original inhabitants

Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) accumulates mutations over generations, so measuring differences between different human populations can estimate the time since they diverged from one another. The team analysed the mtDNA of 260 members of an isolated population living in Malaysia, called the Orang Asil. The ancestors of these people were the original inhabitants of the Malay Peninsula.

Comparisons of mtDNA between the Orang Asil and other sources from Eurasia and Australasia allowed Macaulay’s team to calculate that the first humans arrived in Malaysia around 65,000 years ago. At this time, the northern route out of Africa from the Sinai Peninsula across northern Arabia to the Indian Ocean was blocked by a desert, which early humans would have found almost impossible to cross.

“The southern route has been seen as just another route taken by anatomically modern humans out of Africa,” says Macaulay. “But we are proposing that it is the only route required to explain the mtDNA evidence.”

After reaching Malaysia, a group that would eventually settle Europe branched away, but the main dispersal group made a speedy onward journey to Australia, reaching it only a few thousand years later.
Ancient Australians

The work clears up a question that has long troubled anthropologists: how did modern humans from Africa populate distant Australia long before nearby Europe? The oldest human remains in Australia date from 46,000 to 50,000 years ago, fitting neatly with the new genetics data.

The oldest European human remains, however, consist of an adult male’s jawbone, discovered in Romania and dated to between 34,000 and 36,000 years old.

“If the migrants had taken the northern route by looping northwards to Turkey to avoid the desert, then the question arises why they did not continue to Europe as well and leave ancient finds there,” says Peter Forster of the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research at the University of Cambridge, UK. “By default, the southern route makes more ecological sense.”

The southern coastal route might have made more culinary sense, too. “The change to the incorporation of shellfish in the human diet [suggested by earlier research] may have made the coastal route attractive,” says Macaulay. “It’s even possible that the motivation for expanding eastwards was declining fish stocks in the Red Sea at the time of the glacial maximum, around 70,000 years ago.”

Journal source: Science (vol 308, p 1034)

News: People of Madagascar have origins in Borneo, Africa

http://news.mongabay.com/2005/0503a-rhett_butler.html

People of Madagascar have origins in Borneo, Africa

New study confirms unusual ancestry of the Malagasy
Sailing across the Indian Ocean to make landfall on the world's fourth largest island?
Rhett Butler, mongabay.com
May 3, 2005



An ethnic Sakalava boy near the Manambolo River in western Madagascar. Sakalava usually have African features.


Benja Ramanandoria, an ethnic Merina, near the Isalo National Park in western Madagascar. Merina generally have features characteristic of Indonesian ancestry.

A new study in the American Journal of Human Genetics confirms that the people of Madagascar have origins in both East Africa and also distant Borneo.

Despite the island's proximity to southern Africa, some anthropologists believe it was ethnic Indonesians who first settled Madagascar 1500-2000 years ago. The language of Madagascar, called Malagasy, can be traced back to Indonesia where it most closely resembles the modern Malayo-Polynesian language of Ma'anyan, which is spoken by people in the Barito Valley of southern Borneo. Some anthropologists postulate that these Indonesians could have either sailed directly across the Indian ocean -- possible given the sailing prowess of these people -- or gradually made their way along the coast of South Asia eventually finding their way to the island, which is the fourth largest in the world. On the way, these intrepid explorers could have mixed with mainland Africans or Africans may have arrived at a later date.

Regardless of who set foot first on the island, most experts agree that Madagascar's inhabitants arrived relatively recently. There is no evidence of a stone age in Madagascar and the island was settled around the time Polynesians reached the planet's most isolated place -- Easter Island. It is thought that subsequent migrations have brought other groups (Arabs and Indians) into the ethnic and cultural mix.

The study

The study, led by a team of geneticists at the universities of Cambridge, Oxford and Leicester examined both the Y chromosomes of Madagascar residents -- inherited essentially unchanged from father to son -- and the mitochondrial DNA, which is passed directly from mothers to their children. Tiny mutations in these two forms of DNA can help scientists trace human migration and inheritance.

Benja Ramanandoria, an ethnic Merina, near the Isalo National Park in western Madagascar. Merina generally have features characteristic of Indonesian ancestry.
The researchers found that as a whole, Malagasy people (both the name of the language and the people of Madagascar) are a roughly 50:50 mix of two ancestral groups: Indonesians and East Africans. Today, this mixed origin has produced an interesting set of cultures that draws from southeast Asia, India, Africa, and the Middle East.

Diverse society

Within Madagascar there is a great deal of variation between ethnic groups from the Indonesian-looking Merina in the highlands to Arabic Antaimoro on the eastern coast to the African Sakalava in the south and west of the country. Despite these differences, the Malagasy language is spoken throughout the country, something which is a bit surprising given the size and ethnic diversity of the island. Sharing a common language is the strongest bond between Malagasy -- people's physical appearance, religious practices, and traditions are highly regional.

Malagasy language




Malagasy only recently become a written language. Until Welsh missionaries transcribed the language in the 1820s, the Malagasy had to rely on oral history to mark past events. However, even with the development of a written form, written Malagasy hardly resembles spoken Malagasy -- the last syllable is typically dropped while unstressed syllables in the middle of words often disappear (spelling versus pronunciation was evidently influenced by the Welsh transcribers). The capital city of Antananarivo is pronounced "Tananarive" but usually shortened to "Tana."

Cultural richness

What this all means is the people of Madagascar have a remarkable ancestry. One that has produced a unique set of customs and extraordinary cultural richness. Madagascar is a place where ancestors are as much a part of the present day as they are of the past; where in many areas taboo and tradition takes precedence over the law; and western-style religion is freely mixed with beliefs in sorcery and unparalleled funerary customs.

This article used information from WildMadagascar.org, Reuters, and the American Journal of Human Genetics. For further reading on the people of Madagascar I highly recommend The Eighth Continent by Peter Tyson.

Link: Volcano worship in the Bible

The following link has a list of Biblical verses suggesting either a volcano deity, or as suggested in this blog, a deity that manifests on earth on the top of a holy mountain resulting in a volcanic eruption. The eruption although having a destructive nature is, in the end, generative creating new land and renewing fertility.

http://www.mythandmagick.bravehost.com/VolcanoGod.html

Exodus 19:
16 So it came about on the third day, when it was morning, that there were thunder and lightning flashes and a thick cloud upon the mountain and a very loud trumpet sound, so that all the people who were in the camp trembled.
17 And Moses brought the people out of the camp to meet God, and they stood at the foot of the mountain.
18 Now Mount Sinai was completely in smoke, because the Lord descended upon it in fire. Its smoke ascended like the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mountain quaked greatly.

Exodus 20:
18 And all the people saw the thunderings and the lightenings and the noise of the trumpet, and the mountain smoking, and when the people saw it they removed and stood afar off.
19 And they said unto Moses, speak thou with us and we will hear, but let not God speak with us, least we die.

Exodus 24:
15 And Moses went up into the mount, and a cloud covered the mount
16 And the glory of the LORD abode on mount Sinai and the cloud covered it six days, and the seventh day he called up to Moses out of the midst of the cloud.
17 And the sight of the glory of the LORD was like devouring fire on the top of the mount in the eyes of the children of Israel.

Numbers 11:
1 Now the people became like those who complain of adversity in the hearing of the LORD; and when the LORD heard it, His anger was kindled, and the fire of the LORD burned among them and consumed some of the outskirts of the camp.
2 And the people cried unto Moses; and when Moses prayed unto the LORD the fire was quenched.
3 And he called the name of the place Taberah; because the fire of the LORD had burnt among them.

Deuteronomy 4:
11 "You came near and stood at the foot of the mountain, and the mountain burned with fire to the very heart of the heavens: darkness, cloud and thick gloom.
12 "Then the LORD spoke to you from the midst of the fire; you heard the sound of words, but you saw no form--only a voice.
24 For the LORD our God is a consuming fire, a jealous God.
36 Out of heaven he made thee to hear his voice that he might instruct thee; and upon earth he shewed thee his great fire; and thou heardest his words out of the midst of the fire.

Deuteronomy 5:
22 These words the LORD spake unto all your assembly in the mount out of the midst of the fire of the cloud with a great voice, and he added no more. And he wrote them in two tables of stone and delivered them unto me
23 And it came to pass when he heard the voice out of the midst of darkness (for the mountain did burn with fire) that ye came near unto me even all the heads of your tribes and your elders
24 And ye said behold the LORD our God hath shewed us his glory and his greatness and we have heard his voice out of the midst of the fire, we have seen this day that God doth talk with man and he livith.
25 Now therefore why should we die? For this great fire will consume us; if we hear the voice of the LORD our God anymore, then we shall die.

2 Samuel 22:8
"Then the earth shook and quaked, The foundations of heaven were trembling And were shaken, because He was angry."

Psalms 18:
7 Then the earth shook and quaked; And the foundations of the mountains were trembling And were shaken, because He was angry.
8 Smoke went up out of His nostrils, And fire from His mouth devoured; Coals were kindled by it.
9 He bowed the heavens also, and came down With thick darkness under His feet.
10 He rode upon a cherub and flew; And He sped upon the wings of the wind.
11 He made darkness His hiding place, His canopy around Him, Darkness of waters, thick clouds of the skies.
12 From the brightness before Him passed His thick clouds, Hailstones and coals of fire.
13 The LORD also thundered in the heavens, And the Most High uttered His voice, Hailstones and coals of fire.
14 He sent out His arrows, and scattered them, And lightning flashes in abundance, and routed them.
15 Then the channels of water appeared, And the foundations of the world were laid bare At Your rebuke, O LORD, At the blast of the breath of Your nostrils.

Psalms 104:32
He looks at the earth, and it trembles; He touches the mountains, and they smoke.

Isaiah
24:1
Behold, the LORD lays the earth waste, devastates it, distorts its surface and scatters its inhabitants.
24:20
The earth reels to and fro like a drunkard And it totters like a shack, For its transgression is heavy upon it, And it will fall, never to rise again.

Isaiah 34:
8 For the LORD has a day of vengeance, A year of recompense for the cause of Zion.
9 Its streams will be turned into pitch, And its loose earth into brimstone, And its land will become burning pitch.
10 It will not be quenched night or day; Its smoke will go up forever.

Micah 1:4
The mountains will melt under Him And the valleys will be split, Like wax before the fire, Like water poured down a steep place.

Nahum 1:5
Mountains quake because of Him And the hills dissolve; Indeed the earth is upheaved by His presence, The world and all the inhabitants in it.

Hebrews 12:29
For our God is a consuming fire.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

News: Pigs from Insular Southeast Asia

A new article from the March 11 edition of Science suggests multiple
origin of pig domestication after an initial dispersal of wild boar from
insular Southeast Asia (ISEA):

Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) sequences from 686 wild and domestic pig specimens place the origin of wild boar in island Southeast Asia (ISEA), where they dispersed across Eurasia.

(Greger Larson et al.: "Worldwide Phylogeography of Wild Boar Reveals Multiple Centers of Pig Domestication")

It is interesting, though, that of the four wild boar species -- Sus scrofa, Sus celebensis, Sus barbatus,sv, and Sus verrucosus -- only Sus scrofa, the domesticated variety made out of ISEA.

This might suggest that Sus scrofa was carried out of ISEA as a captive, tamed or domesticated animal by humans. Torsten Pedersen, on various forums, has noted Proto-Austronesian *beRek "pig" and Proto-IndoEuropean *pork'- (also Gothic barg-s***, Latin
aper, German Eber "boar").

Could non-ISEA wild boar actually be feral animals as has recently been discovered with the dingo, formerly thought of as a wild dog? In this regard, Torsten has mentioned the European practice of letting pig herds feed themselves in the forest.

With regard to the dispersion of the domesticated pig, the model suggested by the article matches that theorized by Torsten much earlier for the diffusion of the *beRek related words:

"... and phylogenetic analyses were performed using Bayesian Monte Carlo-Markov chain (MCMC) and median-joining networks. The consensus tree shows that the basal lineage of Sus Scrofa occur in western island Southest Asia (ISEA). An initial dispersal from this area into the Indian subcontinent was followed by subsequent radiations into East Asia and a final, progressive spread across Eurasia into Western Europe."

*** Note from Torsten:

Gothic 'barg-s' (-s is the nominative marker) means "verschnittenes Schwein", ie. gelded pig, not "boar"; I might have been imprecise. In PIE 'barg-' would have been *bhorgh- or *bhork-; this is obviously similar to *pork'-, but there is no way in IE to bridge the gap (no known rules) between /bh/ and /p/ or /gh'/ and /k'/, although a good number of such variants (between voiced aspirated and unvoiced unaspirated stops) exist in the PIE roots as traditionally reconstructed; however the variants are systematically accounted for in Møller's attempt at finding common forms for IE and Semitic (and play a prominent part). Therefore I find it reasonable to assume that *bhorgh- and *pork- is the same root, if that root was a loan.

Also, Latin 'aper', German 'eber' "boar" is probably related to the *(H-)p/bh-r/l- "across the river" root; Benveniste (in Indo-European Language and Society) wrote an article on the meaning of the two IE roots *pork'- and *su- "swine", whether they meant young and old, or wild and domesticated swine, respectively. "Coming from the other side" would be an appropriate name for a non-domesticated swine in a society where duality was pervasive and linked to the two banks of a river.

The full abstract can be found appended below. To find the full text of the article minus graphics, visit this URL:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/1361004/posts


Science. 2005 Mar 11;307(5715):1618-21.

Worldwide phylogeography of wild boar reveals multiple centers of pig domestication.

Larson G, Dobney K, Albarella U, Fang M, Matisoo-Smith E, Robins J, Lowden S, Finlayson H, Brand T, Willerslev E, Rowley-Conwy P, Andersson L, Cooper A.

Henry Wellcome Ancient Biomolecules Centre, University of Oxford, Department of Zoology, South Parks Road OX1 3PS, UK. greger.larson@zoo.ox.ac.uk

Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) sequences from 686 wild and domestic pig specimens place the origin of wild boar in island Southeast Asia (ISEA), where they dispersed across Eurasia. Previous morphological and genetic evidence suggested pig domestication took place in a limited number of locations (principally the Near East and Far East). In contrast, new genetic data reveal multiple centers of domestication across Eurasia and that European, rather than Near Eastern, wild boar are the principal source of modern European domestic pigs.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

Glossary: Shellfish Gathering

The use of shellfish as a primary source of protein has been linked by some researchers with the development of modern homo sapiens.

The earliest anatomically modern humans are associated with shell mounds in South Africa dating to 100,000 years ago. According to one theory of human migrations out of Africa along a southern route, populations hugged the coast because of their shellfish gathering practices.

The human nervous system, like that of all mammals, is composed almost entirely of long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids (LC-PUFA), docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) and arachidonic acid (AA).

These essential fatty acids are generally lacking in land-based animals but high in in fish and shellfish. A study by Broadhurst et al. suggests that the move to shellfish and fish as major parts of the diet is linked with the brain development in early humans. They argue that such a diet "would have provided the advantage in multi-generational brain development which would have made possible the advent of H. sapiens. Restriction to land based foods as postulated by the savannah and other hypotheses would have led to degeneration of the brain and vascular system as happened without exception in all other land based apes and mammals as they evolved larger bodies."

The building of shell mounds by shellfish gathering people eventually took on a cultural form that is rather distinctive. The mounds were usually built at some distance from the community at first. Studies have suggested that the depth of shell mounds increases by about 8 inches to 1 foot per 100 years.

Eventually as the mounds grew high enough the community would often relocate on top of the structure. The raised elevation provided protection from floods and tides. Once on top of the mound, the midden continued to grow. Some waste was disposed of right under the home over the existing midden, while other types of waste were moved to a nearby dump that tended to extend the size of the current mound.

Some middens were also used as burial grounds and platforms for ceremonies. In cultures that still build shell mounds like the sea gypsies of Southeast Asia, the Andaman Islanders and the Nicobar Islanders, the heaps are a source of pride for the community.

Surface of a shell mound, Andaman Islands

In shellfish gathering cultures, the work tends to be done by women while men hunt, fish or do other chores. Consumption of shellfish and fish, on the one hand, is associated with nomadic and underdeveloped communities, and on the other with the food of the world's elite i.e., caviar, escargot, sashimi and oysters.

In the islands of Southeast Asia, shells were formed into blade tools during the early or pre-Neolithic period. These tools were often made from the operculum. In addition to their use as blades, shells were also used for bailers, scrapers, sanders, hooks, shovels and other instruments.

For some uses, shell tools were superior to those made of stone, while inferior for other uses. This situation may have sparked the trade of shell for stone tools and vice a versa in early Southeast Asian cultures.

The value of shells and their availability to seafaring merchants probably led to their eventual use as the first trade currency. The cowrie became the principal shell for this purpose over much of the world.

When the Phoenicians developed coins for trade they made them into the shapes of murex, scallop and triton shells. Today shells are displayed on the coinage of various countries.

Imperial Volute (Cymbiola imperialis Linne) on Philippine sentimo coin

Triton's Trumpet (Charonia tritonis Linne) on Vanuatu 2 vatu coin

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

References

Broadhurst CL, Wang Y, Crawford MA, Cunnane SC, Parkington JE, Schmidt WF. "Brain-specific lipids from marine, lacustrine, or terrestrial food resources: potential impact on early African Homo sapiens." Comp Biochem Physiol B Biochem Mol Biol. 2002 Apr;131(4):653-73.

Shellfish as Trade Goods, http://www.manandmollusc.net/advanced_uses/trade_goods.html

News: Malaria P. vivax diffused from Southeast Asia?

The following abstract of a recent scientific article is of interest because malaria tends to diffuse due to human/mosquito migration.

Mosquitos alone are quite territorial and tend to return again and again to the same host. Occasionally they seek new hosts in the same area, thus spreading the disease.

Since malaria types are linked to specific mosquitos, infected humans traveling alone are not enough to spread the disease from one area to another. It is thought that the main mode of diffusion is humans accidentally transporting infected mosquitos.

While malaria can spread to some extent through trade and other contact, studies have shown that population movement is the most important method of spreading the disease especially over long distances and certain geographical barriers.

The new study shows that P. vivax the parasite that spreads one type of malaria, originated in Southeast Asian macaques. If it can be shown the spread of P. vivax into places like Africa is linked with modern human migration, it would suggest extensive and possibly very ancient links between Southeast Asia and Africa.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento


---
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2005 Feb 8;102(6):1980-5. Epub 2005 Jan 31.

A monkey's tale: The origin of Plasmodium vivax as a human malaria parasite.

Escalante AA, Cornejo OE, Freeland DE, Poe AC, Durrego E, Collins WE, Lal AA.

Division of Parasitic Diseases, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Chamblee, GA 30341.

The high prevalence of Duffy negativity (lack of the Duffy blood group antigen) among human populations in sub-Saharan Africa has been used to argue that Plasmodium vivax originated on that continent. Here, we investigate the phylogenetic relationships among 10 species of Plasmodium that infect primates by using three genes, two nuclear (beta-tubulin and cell division cycle 2) and a gene from the plastid genome (the elongation factor Tu). We find compelling evidence that P. vivax is derived from a species that inhabited macaques in Southeast Asia. Specifically, those phylogenies that include P. vivax as an ancient lineage from which all of the macaque parasites could originate are significantly less likely to explain the data. We estimate the time to the most recent common ancestor at four neutral gene loci from Asian and South American isolates (a minimum sample of seven isolates per locus). Our analysis estimates that the extant populations of P. vivax originated between 4! 5,680 and 81,607 years ago. The phylogeny and the estimated time frame for the origination of current P. vivax populations are consistent with an "out of Asia" origin for P. vivax as hominoid parasite. The current debate regarding how the Duffy negative trait became fixed in Africa needs to be revisited, taking into account not only human genetic data but also the genetic diversity observed in the extant P. vivax populations and the phylogeny of the genus Plasmodium.

Glossary: Abgal

Note: Entries will be added in no particular order, but will be sorted after the entire glossary is completed.


The word abgal is likely a compound of the Sumerian words "father, elder" and "great" and thus would translate as "great elder." The Akkadians modified the pronunciation somewhat into apkallu. In Greek texts, the Abgal are known as Annedoti. The derivation of the latter word is uncertain.

Known as wise sages, the Abgal are often mentioned as a group of seven. Although mentioned in Sumerian fragments, most of what we know of the Abgal comes from Akkadian, latter Mesopotamian and Greek texts. They were said to have come from the sea, and to return there at night. The Greek texts mention specifically the Erythraen Sea. They are also portrayed in sculpture and described in the texts as part fish and part human. Enki, the Lord of the Apsu under Mt. Mashu, is also said to rule over the Abgal.



The Akkadian texts give the following names for the seven Abgal:

Adapa (Greek Oannes)
Uandugga
Enmeduga
Enmegalanna
Enmebuluga
Anenlilda
Utuabzu

The Seven Sages were particularly associated with the Me the canon for each of the Sumerian arts, crafts and sciences. When Gilgamesh brought the boatman Urshanabi to Uruk, he asked the latter to check to verify that that city was indeed layed out according to the Me of the Seven Abgal. The Me for the temples, for example, would specify that they should be formed as rectangular stepped truncated pyramids.

In the story of Apapa, the first abgal, he is described as a fisherman who one day falls into the sea after his boat capsizes. He takes up residence with the fishes after this incidence. Stephen Oppenheimer believes such explanations and also those referring to the abgal returning to the sea at night may hint at "extreme" maritime adaptation. Sea nomads, for example, sleep on their ships at sea during the night.

The concept of fish-like beings or fishermen as teachers and priests extends far beyond Sumer in both time and space.

References

Dalley, Stephanie, Myths from Mesopotamia: Creation, The Flood,
Gilgamesh and others, Oxford Univ. Press, 1991.

Oppenheimer, Stephen, Eden in the East: Drowned Continent of Southeast Asia, London: Phoenix, 1999.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

Epilogue

In the tales of the battles between the Devas and Asuras, the two dual forces fight over possession of the elixir of immortality. My thesis has been that the quest for eternal life is intimately linked with the portal of the three worlds -- the cosmic mountain.

History has shown us that grand conflicts can occur for reasons that seem strange to the modern mind. Even to this day, the world's stability is compromised by the seemingly insoluble struggle for rights over the Temple Mount, Zion and Jerusalem.

Not long ago, Arab and Turk fought for mastery over the holy mosques of Mecca and Medina even though they shared the same faith.

When the Fallen Angels were expelled from Eden, from the holy mount, that became their main goal. The Old Testament states that the mastery and riches of the world would not suffice those expelled. They had to rule "Heaven."

For even they could see the transient nature of the wealth of the Earth. Without life, material possessions have no meaning. So the desire within them, the longing for immortality also compelled them to undertake the quest.

The mouth of the Earth, like that of a fiery she-dragon, was fearful, but the fires within transform the body from perishable to immortal. Only through this entrance, however forboding, can one enter the next realm. The parting of the river, the crossing of the lake, the mouth of the Krater all are symbols of the great last journey.

The possession of this great holy mount then provides the underlying basis for the great dualistic conflict preserved in so many literary traditions. At times it has been converted or localized, but the memory of the real location of those hoary events has never truly faded.

Today and for the forseeable future this memory will continue to influence events even if in a very submerged way. The course of history will continue to swirl around the Nusantao axis mundi.

So, hail to thee great mountain of Heaven, turner of the Wheel of Time!

Finis
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

Note: I will now use this blog to publish a glossary and news articles related to and supporting the thesis of "Quests of the Dragon and Bird Clan." I will also edit and embellish some of the older postings. Please contact me if you have any suggestions. When I have the time I will try to compile all the postings into an easy-to-read and downloadable pdf file.

Epilogue

The Pinatubo Ayta who inhabited the slopes fo the mountain before the 1991 eruption were forced to relocate because of threats from lahar flows. Formerly they lived much like their ancestors had for thousands of years.

The forests around Pinatubo were noted for their natural honey and the Ayta performed a sacred bee dance before and after any honey hunting excursion. The bees that pollinate these and other nearby forests also provided an important trade item in local Nusantao history -- beeswax. This product is mentioned repeatedly in historical trade lists. Appropriately, the country has been a leader in bee-keeping technology led by the late Dr. Roberto Bongabong who encouraged the use of the local Apis cerana species.

Volcanic mud still fills the waterways around Pinatubo. The Sacabia River, for example, which flows near Clark Field is partially filled with mud in some spots.

Sacabia River near the Clark Field perimeter filled with volcanic mud

Ash piles at the Pinatubo crater lake

The "Elephant Cage" just south of the Sacabia River, a former Clark AB communications complex turned museum and expo, on the right is the hospital complex

One advantage of the deposits is that the rich glass content of the volcanic sand makes it of superior quality for construction purposes. Quarries have provided Pampanga and other adjacent provinces with much of their revenues from taxes collected on volcanic sand exports.

The soil is also recognized as more fertile than before due to the eruption but the sand deposits have rendered many former agricultural fields useless for that purpose now. Instead, most have been converted to fish ponds. The delta area of Pampanga even before the eruption had one of the country's oldest and most extensive fish pond systems, possibly an adaptation from previous eruptions.

The strip of land between Pinatubo and the sea was formely covered with dense forest, and to the north of these forests lived the Sambal peoples. The hardwoods that played a prominent part in the trade of Sanfotsi/Zabag are found here and include the highly-valued Philippine Mahogany and Narra. At one time, the forests at the northwestern edge of Clark were used for "jungle survival" training. The combination of inpenetrable overgrowth and marshy waterways made the eastern approach to Pinatubo very difficult in previous periods.

To the southwest of the mountain near the Manila Bay are the Candaba wetlands, one of three major gathering spots for migratory birds in the Philippines. The adjacent delta communities once served as trading ports that spanned Southeast Asia, and at one time, far beyond in my view.

The area is ideally located between the spice islands to the southeast with their unique products like nutmeg, cloves, mace and a high grade cinnamon, and the precious aloeswood and cassia produced in Indochina and South China. Although located on the far eastern corner of the "Old World," the region is right on the edge of that region with the "New World."

In colonial times, the port of Manila not far to the south was the major link between various points in the two worlds during the Manila galleon trade. And in modern times, the geostrategic importance of this area has come into play.

When the Japanese attacked these islands during World War II, they first struck Clark airfield, and the defense of the Philippines was concentrated in the jungles of Bataan, the northern edge of which reaches the southern foothills of Pinatubo.

Today, some of the most important sea and air lanes of the world intersect this general region. From the days, that the star Spica stood at Pinatubo's zenith, the region has never completely fell out of the world's view.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

Epilogue

Archaeological sites around Pinatubo and Arayat are scarce. Some of the main finds have been cemtered near the town of Porac. The late archaeologist Otley Beyer mentioned several Neolithic tools found at Porac (Hacienda Ramona) before World War II, one of which he thought might actually come from that age. Others he believed were holdovers into later periods. Unfortunately these were discovered during plowing of fields rather than controlled excavations.

Generally, the area around Pinatubo offers difficulties for archaeological work because each of the half dozen Holocene eruptions can dump dozens or, in some cases, hundreds of feet of ejected material. When this is lahar it can dry to a concrete-like hardness. Much of the continually-populated area to the south is or was of delta type and thus the landscape is always changing. Many old riverside communities may have been washed all the way to the bay due to regular floods that hit the region.

Color relief map showing ash deposits around Pinatubo.

The bases around Pinatubo were closed shortly after the Persian Gulf War, during which they were used extensively, following an intense negotiation period with the Philippine government over new leasing. According to the Ayta peoples who lived around the mountain at the time, Pinatubo erupted because of drilling and/or excavating along its sides.

The Pinatubo Ayta still believe in the deity that is said to inhabit their most sacred mountain. There are different accounts as to who exactly was doing the digging but the story may illustrate how the ages-old clan conflict has evolved and survived into modern times.

The traditionalist camp would be found in those today who have a close bond with nature with a natural disdain for destructive and polluting technology. Such views are held by many indigenous peoples and by environmentalists in general.

In many indigenous cultures, the people had great respect for other forms of life. When they went to fish, hunt, gather or harvest they first conducted special rites. In the ancient Pacific, for example, they would make an offering and ask permission first from the tree spirit before cutting it down to make a canoe. In the Philippines, permission was asked from the rice god, the manifestation of the rice plant itself, before harvesting and thanksgiving was given afterward.

The traditional Hawaiians during the Makahiki season forbade hunting, fishing and similar activities giving populations time to recover and replenish. In many cultures, fishing nets were designed so the smaller fish could escape and have time to grow into reproducing adults.

Nothing can illustrate this close bond with nature more than the fact that many indigenous people believed in an actual kinship with certain forms of nature through totemic relationship.

Among non-indigenous folk, this thinking is represented in those who see the need to protect the environment and to promote sustainable and smart living strategies. They recognize that while technology has brought progress, it has also wrought tremendous destruction. Many species have been driven to extinction due in large part to technological advances. Human inventions have also contributed to the increased ability of weapons of war. In the 20th century alone, more people may have died due to war than in all previous human history.

The traditional thinking of the Dragon and Bird Clan may then be represented by those who promote sound environmental and ecological progress. They tend to believe though that the quest for wealth drives society towards destructive practices.

The opposition then would naturally be those among whom materialism is an obvious prime motivating factor. The buzz word for this ideology is "growth," which can also be seen as meaning basically "wealth acquisition." Thinkers of this kind would tend to downplay the negative effects of technological progress on the environment, or on society in general.

The clearest identifying factors in this dualistic conflict though would be found in the traditional mindset, which is still inclusive and egalitarian, while the opposing camp tends to be exclusive, and elitist to a strong degree.

The battle now is more ideological than clan-oriented, although in insular Southeast Asia, at least, the clan elements have not disappeared entirely.

The battleground for the "great war" varies and can include the halls and conference rooms of the United Nations, the Kyoto summit and some forsaken rez (reservation) in the middle of "nowhere."

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

Epilogue

In the Churning of the Milky Ocean story, the battle between the Devas and Asuras produces many wondrous things that appear from the frothy sea. This war, which I have suggested was a clash between Nusantao trading clans, would indeed have set off a chain of wondrous historical events starting after the 4th millennium BC Pinatubo eruption.

When the Spanish came into the region many thousands of years later, the mountainous region that I believe was the model for many legends, was inhabited and surrounded by various peoples. They spoke different languages including Kapampangan, Ayta and Sambal which may have descended from a single ancestor known as Proto-Central Luzon. The likely point of divergence of these languages would have been the foothills of Pinatubo itself. These peoples were remnants of the old Lusung kingdom.

Traces of this kingdom could be found from the province of Pangasinan in the north of the island to the Calabarzon region in the south, an area that presently hosts the bulk of Luzon's 43 million people.

Many of the largest population centers in the Philippines at the time were located downriver from Pinatubo in the delta areas adjacent to the northern part of Manila Bay. Included among these towns was Betis with 7,000 males of fighting age in 1582 -- probably translating to a total population of about 28,000 to 30,000. In comparison, London in 1575 had 180,000 people.

Many of these settlements may have been formed after the pre-1991 eruption of Pinatubo some five to seven centuries ago. This was a major event of probably around magnitude 5 level that filled up large parts of what was then the Manila Bay. Consequently the region around Pinatubo itself was sparsely populated when the Spanish arrived. The riverine communities, though, were still conducting long-range trade and had come under minimal Muslim influence.

Slowly, after colonization, the area around Pinatubo became the target of increased development culminating in the founding of Angeles City, probably appropriately named, in the 19th century. Angeles, or the "City of Angels" was formed from the small community known as Kuliat.

When the Americans came to colonize the Philippines, which had briefly won its independence from Spain, Angeles was the location of a major battle for Central Luzon. A U.S. army camp was established there that later was shifted to the present location of Clark Field, northwest of the city.


Aerial flight map showing Clark Air Base, now Clark Field, between Mt. Pinatubo and Mt. Arayat, and northwest of Angeles City.

The base was located at or very near what I consider the prime Neolithic location. One of the names for Mt. Arayat is Paralaya, meaning to the East. You can see from the map above that Mt. Arayat is indeed nearly due east of Clark Field, and it is located nearly exactly between Pinatubo and Arayat. It was said that this location was chosen because it provided better grazing areas for U.S. army horses.

On the other side of Mt. Pinatubo, in Subic Bay, a naval base was constructed near the location of an ancient Ayta village.

Pinatubo and Arayat were always inhabited especially by the "guardians" who still exist today, although there existence has probably been informal if not secretive since Spanish times. The eruptions change this only temporarily.

In 1991, a massive magnitude 6 eruption caused both bases to be evacuated. They were later converted into government-managed zones for commercial and tourist activity. Duty-free stores, expos, golf courses, country clubs, tourist hotels and the like have been set up in these former military bases. Clark Field is also the location of an international airport constructed from the old air force flight line that was used extensively during the Vietnam War.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

Epilogue

Both Columbus and Magellan had set courses toward a destination linked with ancient legends. Their quest was one written of since the dawn of history. For the first time though documented in a clear fashion.



In 1516, Thomas More wrote the novel Utopia, three years before Magellan would set out on his historic voyage. More actually coined the phrase "utopia" for this work.

Utopia was located evidently somewhere between the mythical Castellum in the newly-discovered land of South America, and Taprabone. In More's time, Taprabone (Taprobane) probably referred to Sumatra rather than Sri Lanka due to the testimony of Nicolo de Conti.

The book tells of the travels of narrator Hythloday who is said to be a companion of Amerigo Vespucci, and to have completed the latter's aborted fourth voyage around the world. In essence, Hytholday anticipates Magellan's own circumnavigation. En route he spends more than five years in the mysterious Utopia.

Romuald I. Lakowski believes the writings of More's brother-in-law John Rastell offer clues on the former's geographical thinking.

Rastell wrote The Interlude of the Four Elements in 1517-1520 shortly after More's Utopia. He gives a short description of the world's geography starting with the journey to the "New World" in the West. Then Rastell describes the classic voyage to the East starting from Jerusalem.

Loo, estwarde beyonde the great occyan
Here entereth the see callyd Mediterran,
of two thousand myle of lengthe.
The Soudans contrey lyeth here by,
The great Turke on the north syde doth ly,
A man of merveylous strengthe.
This sayde north parte is callyd Europa,
And this south parte callyd Affrica,
This eest parte is callyd Ynde [Indies],
But this newe landys founde lately
Ben callyd America by cause only
Americus dyd furst them fynde.
Loo, Jherusalem lyeth in this contrey,
And beyonde is the Red See,
That Moyses maketh of mencyon
This quarter is India Minor
And this quarter India Maior,
The lande of Prester Johnn. (829-46)

The land of Prester John sits at the extreme East and north of it is the kingdom of the "Cane of Catowe" generally seen as hearkening back to the old "Khan of Cathay" in Yuan dynasty China.

From these eastern lands, Rastell followed the geographers of his day in greately underestimating the distance from the fabled East eastward to Britain, which he claims is a "lytell paste a thousande myle."

The land described by More, unlike the destinations of Columbus and Magellan, may have been located in the southern hemisphere. Possibly he was following Vespucci's Quattuor Navigationes in this regard. This thinking might be related to older geographies like those of Ptolemy that tended to place the most eastern ports, like that of Cattigara, south of the equator.

Also, ancient legends of the Saturnian Isle of the Greeks, where the Golden Age continued and where Kronus rules, often thought of the location as antipodean in both the east-west and north-south directions. A number of scholars believe More's work shows influences from Macrobius' Commentary on the Dream of Scipio and Saturnalia, which delve into the lost Golden Age of humanity.

More indicates that Utopia was inhabited by 'gymnosophaon/gymnosophan' or "philosophers" similar to the yogis of India. The book also gives examples of the Utopian "alphabet."

The cities were limited to no more than 6,000 families and the househould consisted of the extended rather than the nuclear family.

Trade and navigation were important to the Utopians and were pursued with energy. Foreigners, especially those of honor and ability, were welcome.

If any man was to go among them that had some extraordinary talent, or that by much travelling had observed the customs of many nations (which made us to be so well received), he would receive a hearty welcome; for they are very desirous to know the state of the whole world. Very few go among them on the account of traffic, for what can a man carry to them but iron or gold or silver, which merchants desire rather to export than import to a strange country: and as for their exportation, they think it better to manage that themselves than to leave it to foreigners, for by this means, as they understand the state of the neighboring countries better, so they keep up the art of navigation, which cannot be maintained but by much practice.

Utopia was viewed by More and those who borrowed his mythical land as a type of ideal society located in an Indian Ocean island (the Pacific was still unknown), a remnant of the Golden Age.

Magellan had identified the golden destination as "Tarsis and Ofir" in his own writing referring to the legendary Biblical lands. Columbus was heading toward Cipangu, and he may have been carrying Behaim's Globe which also identifies this island in the legend as Ophir.

Quests for the Golden Land had driven history for ages, and were for the first time coming into much clearer view than ever before.


The Pertotum Circulum of 1440 using archaic geography shows lands in the east far below the equator. Notice in the farthest east just below the equinotical line, on the mainland is the Garden of Eden with Adam and Eve inset in a square. In the southeast corner, east of Tabrobane (Taprobana) is Curiga an island of the "sunrise" associated with Prester John.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

The End and Beginning

In Buddhist tradition, a 5,000 year cycle also exists. This is originally said to start with the Buddha's dispensation or sasana. It consists of five 1,000 year periods in which each of the five major teachings of the Buddha Siddharta Gautama disappears starting at the time of his death.

Interestingly, after women are allowed into Buddhist monastic life, the Buddha cuts these periods in half from 1,000 to 500 years. This makes the whole cycle 2,500 years instead of 5,000 years and in essence calibrates fairly well with the periods discussed previously.

There are different opinions as to the date of the Buddha's death, and even the length of these cycles are altered in various traditions. However, generally the more widely accepted dates range around the 5th or 6th century BC.

If we use the date most popular among present-day scholars of 480 BC, then the 2,500 year period ends in 2020 AD. At that time, the "disappearance of the relics" occurs and the "true dharma" or Buddhist practice vanishes.

The monks and stream attainers will be strong in their union with Dharma for 500 years after the Blessed One's Parinirvana. In the second 500 years they will be strong in meditation; in the third period of 500 years they will be strong in erudition. In the fourth 500 years period they will only be occupied with gift giving. The final or fifth period of 500 years will see only fighting and reproving among the monks and followers. The pure Dharma will then become invisible.

Abhidharmakosha 4.12c. III. p. 41

Exactly what happens at the end of this period of decay is not entirely clear. According to some traditions, a new Buddha known as Maitreya will appear shortly bringing about yet another dispensation and starting the "wheel of dharma," the new cycle all over again.

Among Tibetan Buddhists, the cyclic period is intertwined with the reigns of the kings of Shambhala. Each king is said to have a nice rounded reign of 100 years, but the texts make it clear this is just an approximate figure.

As stated earlier, there are two different chronologies for the Shambhala kings. Both are calibrated to the bringing of the Kalacakra Tantra to India in about 960 AD. According to one tradition this happened during the reign of the 12th Rigden king named Surya. In the other tradition, it is Sripala from the Southern Ocean who is either the 17th or 18th king.

In each tradition, the Shambhala dynasties are made to start at the death of the Buddha, which again we will set at 480 BC, or 1440 years before the Kalacakra comes to India. Thus, according to the first tradition the average length of each reign is 120 years (1440/12).

However, in the second tradition the average reign is either 80 or 84 years depending on whether Sripala is the 17th or 18th king in the lineage.

Thus, using these average reign lengths, the start of the reign of the last king, the messianic Rigden Drakpo, would begin in either of the years 2520, 2061 or 2000 AD depending on whether it was the reign of the 12th, 17th or 18th king respectively.

Here again we see a gradual moral decline eventually resulting in the materialistic Lalos occupying the land south of the Sita River. Finally in the time of Rigden Drakpo, a formidable king of the Lalos breeches the inner sanctum of Shambhala, conceived of as a mountain surrounded by rings of mountains or hills. The intrustion into the sacred realm sets off a cataclysmic battle described in more mystical than realistic fashion.

The forces of Shambhala emerge victorious ushering in the new golden age.

The Rigden Drakpa like Satria Piningit, the Hidden Warrior of Java, is the quintessential "King of the East" remaining out of view until the tide of evil has reached its peak.

The new dawn is in essence really a return to a more pristine condition that existed before, and this utopian age is personified in the Hidden Warrior.

In the many of the traditions studied here, the Golden Age arrives with the seemingly supernatural formation of a river and/or lake of "living water." This would be none other than the Krater of Hermetic tradition, and where the waters of life are, there shall the migrating birds venture.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

The Long Count

The Kalajnana uses the Kaliyuga era starting in 3102 BC to predict events in the future. The dates of 5101 (1999) and 5105 (2003) are given for the return of Kalki to establish "Viradharma," a South Indian form of Siva worship (Virasaivism). The Indian year starts in spring, so 5101 would last from spring 1999 to spring 2000.

In Nostradamus famed collection of prophecies known as Centuries, one of his most well-known quatrains (X. 72) reads:

In the year 1999, in the seventh month
the great king of terror shall come from the sky
he shall resurrect the great king of the Angolmois
before and after Mars rules

This quatrain has been linked by some with the coming golden age alluded to in other Nostradamus prophecies, although it's vagueness has given rise to some disagreement.

Nostradamus saw the period from creation to the end of the world lasting 8,000 years and ending in 3797 AD, but he also envisioned lesser cycles similar to that of the Great Week. Using the above data, Nostradamus would have the world begin in 4203 BC, although one of his writings, possibly due to some error, results in counts indicating 4757 or 4758 years before the common era.

European Christian tradition usually follows Eusebius of Caesarea who gives a date of about 3947 BC.

The most common used dating for the start of the Mayan calendar is 3114 BC and the calendar lasts for about 5,125 years. So if we take the date of 1999 in Nostradamus quatrain as proximate to the end/start point in a system of ages, we have:

	Start date	End Date	Duration
Mayan	3114 BC	2012 AD	5,125 years
Nostradamus	4203 BC	1999 AD	6,202 years
Kalajnana	3102 BC	1999/2003 AD	5,101 (5,103) years

I suggested earlier that the start of these cycles may have originated from knowledge diffused by the Nusantao starting in the fourth millennium BC. The difference in precise dates may be due to the fact that the original dates were astrological in nature rather than calendar counts. Different systems used in calculating back to the astronomical phenomenon resulted in varying but still generally close dates.

The Biblical estimates come from the sums of genealogy lists and confusion in this regard may have lead to considerable error. However, considering that the ante-diluvian genealogies appear related to Sumerian king-lists, an astronomical date from the latter tradition is warranted. I believe that would coincide with the period when Spica was located over the latitudes marking the Anu and Enlil path junction. The orientation of building toward this star would resemble in some whay the Qiblah of a mosque oriented toward Mecca, or the Jewish synagogue oriented toward Jerusalem.

The start of the Egyptian calendar varies according to views on what is known as the Sothic cycle. However, from the astronomical viewpoint, the calendar would be calibrated with the coincidence of the heliacal rising of Sirius and the summer solstice at around 3300 BC.

But what of the duration of these cycles? The year 1999 in Nostradamus presumably could have been borrowed from the Kalajnana. An interesting theory offered by scholar Rudy Cambier suggests that Nostradamus borrowed his Centuries from the work of 14th century Cistercian monk Yves de Lessines.

While we will not discuss Cambier's theories on the meaning of the Centuries, he does suggest a connection with the Templars. As you may remember, I mentioned previously a Cistercian abbey in Portugal where an early world map was found. The Cistercian order had close ties with the Templars since the time of Bernard de Clairvaux who had helped to obtain the order's rule. When the Templars were persecuted many sought refuge at Cistercian monasteries.

Did Yves de Lessines have access to Kalajnana traditions through some Templar intermediaries? Unfortunately, there is little more information to make a guess on this one.

However, we can say that the general duration for these cycles does appear to have an astronomical link. In the various traditions, the idea of a conjunction or alignment particularly with regard to the planets is apparent.

According to Berossus, the Great Year ends when the planets come together in one constellation. In Indian tradition, the Kaliyuga started when all the planets were aligned near the star Revati. The savior Kalki comes during a conjunction in the lunar asterism Pushya.

Indeed, with regard to the traditional date for the start of Kaliyuga, the planets did form a very loose conjunction near Revati. It was not the exact alignment suggested in the literature, but then again such precision does not seem to have been the major concern.

The Mayan calendar is fairly clearly set forth. The Mayans had various calendar counts that involved both planetary cycles and the Mayan sacred number counts.

The sacred counting system involved recurring cycles of counts of 20 and 13. Their astronomical observations mainly were concerned with the synodic periods of planets, i.e., the time period between conjunctions of each planet with the Sun. However, the Mayans payed much attention to Venus and had additional counts for this planet.

Conjunctions of these various calendar counts were considered holy to the Mayans. And the grand conjunction of nearly all of them made up their entire sacred calendar known as the Long Count.

The Long Count consisted of 5,200 tun, the Mayan year of 360 days, which converts to about 5,125 solar years. In order to get all their cycles to coincide neatly, the Mayans rounded off planetary cycles and sometimes added an extra day. Again, precision was not as important as the value of achieving a nice round sacred number.

Therefore in 2012, if one accepts the common start date of 3114 BC, the following list of calendar counts will coincide for the first time in 5125 years:

Cycles coinciding at end of Long Count

Cycle	Duration	Total in Cycle
Baktun	144,000 days, 400 tun	13
52 Tun/72 Almanac Cycle	18,720 days	100
Katun	7,200 days, 20 tun	260
Nine Sacred Almanac/Twenty 117-Day Cycle	2,340 days	800
Triple Sacred Almanac[Mars Synodic Period]	780 days	2,400
585-Day Cycle[Venus Synodic Period]	585 days	3,200
Double Sacred Almanac Triple Lunar Half-Node Cycle	520 days	3,600
400 day cycle[Jupiter Synodic Period?]	400 days	4,680
Tun	360 days	5,200
Tzolkin	260 days	7,200
Venus Visibility as Evening Star	250 days	7,488
Cycle Associated with Rain God [Mercury Synodic Period]	117 days	16,000
Venus Invisibility at Superior Conjunction	90 days	20,800
Five Trecena Cycle	65 days	28,800
Haab Calendar Round	52 days	36,000
30-Day Lunation	30 days	62,400
Uinal	20 days	93,600
Trecena	13 days	144,000
Venus Invisibility at Inferior Conjuction	8 days	234,000
Glyph G Cycle Lords of the Night (Bolon-ti-ku)	9 days	208,000
Two, Three and Five Day Cycles	various	various

The table above suggests the Long Count is based on a "great" version of the short count with the katun as the specific unit: 20 X 13 = 260 katuns or 5,200 tuns. All the synodic periods, used to calculate heliacal risings, coincide except that of Saturn. So we might look at the Long Count as timed to a mutual rising of five of the planets from behind the Sun's bright rays coinciding with the sacred number calendar rounds.

The astrologers of the Kalajnana searching for a conjunction similar to that near Revati in 3102 BC, probably used methods like those of the Mayans in finding the least common multiples of the various planetary conjunctions. Apparently this landed them on the date of Kali 5101 or 1999-2000.

That year was not far off the mark as 5101 ended in spring 2000 about a month before a seven planet conjunction near Revati. This conjunction like that of 3102 BC was not very precise however with an orb (error) of about 35 degrees.

The Long Count (5,125 years) and the Kalajnana cycle (5,101 years) are relatively close to a fifth of the precession or about 5,156 years. The Nostradamus cycle (6,202 years) is less accurately a fourth of the precession or about 6,445 years.

Of the planets that come into alignment at the coming new age, Venus stands out in many cultures. Quetzalcoatl, Isis, Inanna and Ishtar all have close association with Venus. The stars Sirius and Spica are likewise linked with this planet. Tala, as the Morning Star, heralds the renewal of the great cycle.

A Kiribati sky dome or maneaba (maneapa) used to teach children about the sky and stars

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

The Return of the Virgin

“Now the Virgin returns, the reign of Saturn returns, now a new generation descends from heaven on high. Only do thou, pure Lucina, smile on the birth of the child, under whom the iron brood shall first cease, and a golden race spring up throughout the world!"

So said the Roman writer Virgil in the 1st century BC in his Fourth Eclogue. Aratus who wrote a well-known poem on astronomy claimed that Themis the goddess of justice left the world and took refuge in Virgo at the end of the last Golden Age. She returns only at the dawn of the new Golden Age according to Virgil, indicating a decline in virtue and justice in the interceding period.

While some believe the reference to Virgo may refer to the precessional cycle of the equinoxes, another possibility is an oblique reference to Spica, alpha Virginis, as the bearing marker for the geographic origin of the age.

The orientation of the Neo-Babylonian temples brings to mind the Sumerian concept of the Me, the systems of measurements, rules and guidelines for the arts, crafts and sciences. The Me were especially associated with the Seven Sages, the abgal who come from the sea.

Abgal are said to provide the proportions of the ziggurat as model of the cosmic mountain, a structure where the measure of the base width is significantly greater than the temple height. This gives an image of a broad low mountain rather than a steep or cone-shaped one.

Spica also has significance in ancient Egyptian astronomy. A temple to Menat in Thebes built around 3200 BC appears oriented toward that star. At least one temple in the New Kingdom city of Akhenaton also appears so aligned although Spica's declination had changed considerably by that time.

Livio Catullo Stecchini, whose expertise was metrology, the history of measurement, believed that Spica served as the ancient meridian in Egypt during certain periods. He notes that in their rectangular sky charts, Spica is placed near the center.

If you remember, Sirius and Venus were both said to have special links with the Egyptian goddess Isis and the Sumerian goddess Inanna. Spica was also closely related to these goddesses, and appears to be from this association that the sign of Virgo originated. In Sumer, both Spica and Sirius are called ban "shooting bow."

Many megaliths also seem aligned on Spica at different periods with no apparent link to equinotical points. This suggests that the star was revered for some other reason.

The timing of the return of the Golden Age has vexed many cultures. Some have equated it with the Great Year, the precession of the equinoxes, when after about 25,920 years, the stars return to their "original" position.

However, there were also shorter cycles usually lasting around 5,000 to 6,000 years. These may have been attempts to divide the Great Year, but in many of the involved cultures there is no clear evidence of knowledge of the precession.

In Jewish-Christian circles, the idea of a "Great Week" of 6,000 years followed by a 1,000 year Golden Age or Great Sabbath was innovated with the calendar calibrated to start at around 4000 BC. In the far-off Mayan culture, the calendar started in the first few centuries before 3000 BC, depending on which estimate you use, and lasts about 5,125 solar years.

The Hindu cycle starts at 3102 BC and although the present Kaliyuga eras last for much longer than even a Great Year, an interesting prophetic text from South India also hints at a shorter age.

The Kalajnana written about 1,000 years ago mentions dates like 1999 and 2003 in association with the coming of a golden age and the savior king Kalki, who is also known in the text as Virabhoga Vasantaraya.

The year 1999 suprisingly enough also appears some five centuries later in the prophecies of the renowned French prophet Nostradamus. Next we will examine whether there might be any connection between these dates so widely spread apart in time and place.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

Eden's Bearings

The position of the Pleiades constellation rising in the East near or conjunct with the ecliptic is a valuable chronometer. This would place it at or close to the point of the spring (vernal) equinox.

Because the period from one vernal equinox to the next is shorter than the stellar year, the star position of the equinox changes by about one degree every 72 years. In about 25,920 years this point marking the beginning of spring will have made a full circle around the zodiac.

Evidence of an early, probably Neolithic people who marked important events not by conventional calendars but by associated astronomical configurations is a major thesis of books like Hamlet's Mill.

Austronesians appear to have been one such type of people. We don't know if Austronesians ever had calendar counts, but if they did these must have been assigned to the recondite knowledge used by initiates only. However, we do know that they often marked events, including those found in their mythologies, with heavenly conjunctions or other phenomenon. For example, the Hawaiian legend of the explorer Hawai`i-loa who noticed a conjunction of the Pleiades and Aldebaran with Jupiter and steered toward these stars to discover Polynesia.

In this case, we see that the stars indicate both place, as directional bearings, and time, by means of the timing of the stellar conjunction.

Babylonian astronomy might preserve something of a similar sort from the Sumerians with regard to the location of our cosmic volcanoes. Mesopotamian seals often contain depictions of astronomical configurations in scenes of significant mythological events.

The star known as Nibiru (also Neberu, Nebiru) to the Mesopotomians has more than one identification by researchers in this field. The one that is of interest for us is Nibiru's identification with Jupiter. In the cosmological Enuma elish (7.124ff), Nibiru is one of the fifty names given to Jupiter, the planet of Marduk:

Nebiru shall hold the crossings of heaven and earth;
Those who failed of crossing above and below,
Ever of him shall inquire.
Nebiru is the star which in the skies is brilliant.
Verily, he governs their turnings, to him indeed they look
Saying: "He who the midst of the Sea restlessly crosses,
Let 'Crossing' be his name who controls its midst.
May they uphold the course of the stars of heaven;
May he shepherd all the gods like sheep.

From the quote above, it would appear that Nebiru is connected in some way with crossings over the sea. In fact, the name "Nebiru" is derived from eberu, "to cross," and actually means "ferry, ferryman, ford." The authors of Hamlet's Mill connect Nibiru with Urshanabi the ferryman to Paradise in the epic of Gilgamesh.

What is particularly interesting about Nibiru is that the planet's "point" or "station" is used by the Babylonians, and also likely by their predecessors, to construct celestial maps. The following quote refers to Jupiter/Marduk measuring the universe:

He determined the year by designating the zones:
He set up three constellations for each of the twelve months.
After defining the days of the year (by means) of (heav­enly) figures,
He founded the station of Nebiru to determine their (heav­enly) bands,
That none might transgress or fall short.
Alongside he set up the stations of Enlil and Ea.

The 'heavenly bands' constructed with the "station of Nebiru" as the reference point are known as the paths of Anu, Enlil and Ea.

According to authorities on Babylonian astronomy referenced in Hamlet's Mill, the path of Anu is parallel to the celestial equator and extends to a point about 15 to 17 degrees north and south of our own equator. The path of Enlil is a band of similar width north of the path of Anu, while the path of Ea is the southern zone of equal measure.

The latitude of 15-17 degrees North, of course, would fit well with both Mt. Pinatubo and Mt. Arayat. The question is though whether this station of Nebiru, obviously a fixed star or constellation used to build the entire planisphere of the Babylonians, was north or south of the equator.

According to researcher F. M. Th. Bohl, the station of Nebiru was the point of entry of Jupiter into the path of Anu observed during the night of the vernal equinox, the Babylonian New Year.

During this period, the equinox occured when the sun entered the constellation I-Iku which is identified either with the square of Pegasus or some location in the Aries group.

In either case, a night observation of Jupiter with that planet entering an area corresponding to the geocentric latitudes (declination) of 15 to 17 degrees would point to the constellation Virgo. I would suggest the star Spica, or alpha Virginis.

Indeed, researchers Paul Neugabauer and Albert Schott following the work of Günter Martiny, have suggested that Neo-Babylonian (Assyrian) temples were oriented toward the azimuth intersecting Spica and the vernal equinox at the horizon. Of the three, Neugebauer gave up on the idea when he could not find any evidence that Spica was an important star in Babylonian astronomy.

However, I would suggest that Spica was indeed the station of Nibiru, the point used to demarcate the boundary of the paths of Enlil and Anu, and by similar proportion also the path of Ea.

During 3102 BC, the date of the beginning of the modern era in the Hindu calendar, Spica was located directly above about 15.48 degrees North latitude. The position was not much different at the beginning of the Mayan calendar according to the estimate that places that date in the year 3114 BC.

Thus, Spica would have been an excellent zenith star for navigators seeking the sacred volcanoes. It would have been very nearly directly overhead at its highest point in the sky. As such, Spica would also have acted as a bearing star since it would be directly to the east when rising and to the west when setting, if the observer is at the corresponding latitude.

With Nibiru as the ferry-person to Paradise from the "confluence of the rivers," it would be logical that his station would be guiding star to that very location, at a time when the Pleiades marked the point of the spring equinox.

Spica is also widely thought to be the starting point of the lunar mansions of the Chinese zodiac. Among Pacific Islanders, Spica is often paired with Arcturus, the zenith star of the island of Hawai'i, by traditional navigators to determine latitude using the different rising/setting times, if any, of both stars.

If we combine this conjecture, with the earlier one made regarding the meridian of Yamakoti, then we get surprisingly accurate coordinates for the ancient axis mundi. Of course, the longitude given by the Hindu astronomical texts depends on whether one identifies "Romaka-pura" as Alexandria or Rome. There is good reason to think it is the former.

According to the astronomer Varahamihira, the Romaka Siddhanta, written in Romakapura, has a year length nearly exactly that used by Ptolemy and Hipparchus. There are also rather close values to Ptolemy's anomaly of the equation of center, and for that astronomer's revolution length of the Moon's nodes. This would indicate that the Romaka Siddhanta borrowed largely from the astronomical work carried out in Alexandria, and specifically by Ptolemy. Yamakoti, or "Yama's Peak" would in this case be the location of the Underworld kingdom where both the good and bad go after death. The same symbolic location within Mt. Mashu traveled to by Gilgamesh.

With Romakapura as Alexandria, the corresponding meridian of Yamakoti to the east of Lanka, which Indian astronomers equate with Avanti (75.76E), would be at about 121.64 degrees East, a bit more than the longitude of Pinatubo.

Varahamihira's Quadrants (Romaka = Alexandria)

Lanka (75.76E) - Romaka (29.88E) = 45.88 degrees

Lanka (75.76E) + 45.88 = 121.64E degrees (meridian of Yama's Peak)

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

The Hidden Hero

Mythologists have long recognized the motif of the hidden or sleeping hero. In many cases, these myths take the form of messengers or incarnations (avatars) of a deity sent to earth. Often researchers trace these myths back to the earliest known examples in literature such as that of the abgal of Sumer.

As discussed earlier, the abgal are seven sages sent to earth one after another by the god Enki (Ea). Like Enki who came swimming from Dilmun in the East, these sages arise from the sea. In many instances, we find a similar motif of a hero concealed in the ocean , on an antipodean island, or in a mountain.

Quetzalcoatl, the Mesoamerican deity predicted to return one day, is sometimes said to be in the heart of the ocean. The Hindu savior Kalki is also said to rise from the sea on a white horse. Kalki is an avatar of Visnu, whose first incarnation was in the form of a great fish (matsya) that saves humanity from the flood. In the apocryphal IV Esdras (8:3) the messiah appears as a man coming from the "heart of the sea" in the sixth vision of the prophet.

King Arthur of Celtic fame was sometimes located in the "depth" of the sea or on an antipodean island, sleeping to awake in latter times.

The ancient Kai or Zoroastrian kings went to their repose in the mysterious palace of Kang-dez often said to be in the middle of the cosmic mountain. From there they will accompany the final savior in the last battle between good and evil. The Shi'ites believe the Hidden Imam and his sons wait on five islands for the coming of the messianic al-Mahdi.

A whole host of European monarchs became sleeping heroes hidden in mountains to include Frederick Barbarossa in Kyffhäuser Mountain and Karl V and his army in Odin's mountain.

The Javanese know their coming hero as Satria Piningit the "Concealed Warrior," and the Old Testament says in a passage often cited as messianic:

Listen, O isles, unto me; and hearken, ye people, from far; The LORD hath called me from the womb; from the bowels of my mother hath he made mention of my name. And he hath made my mouth like a sharp sword; in the shadow of his hand hath he hid me, and made me a polished shaft; in his quiver hath he hid me.

Isaiah 49:1-2

Like the planet or star that enters the Underworld by seemingly sinking into the ocean or mountain to the West, only to rise again from the East, so to the cosmic heroes. However, as we can see authentic historical figures, like the Holy Roman emperors, were assigned to the same motif, so it cannot be explained merely as a Jungian archetype. From the perspective of this work, the returning hero is Tala of the Dragon and Bird Clan.

The coming of the saving hero is sometimes indicated with rather vague chronological clues, but at other times with actual dates, at least in the form of the expected year of appearance.

These dates appear based on an astronomical cycle which has been widely studied. Giorgio de Santillana and Hertha von Dechend examined this cycle, which has been linked with the creation of various calendars, in Hamlet's Mill.

Although estimates for the cycle's beginning vary from about 4,000 BC to 3,000 BC, most tend to point toward the first few centuries before 3,000 BC.

During this period, the star Sirius rose out of the Sun's bright light, known as the heliacal rising, at around the time of the summer solstice. The Pleiades constellation, or "Seven Sisters," was very near the ecliptic, the path of the Sun, and was very close to exactly due East when rising above the horizon.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento