Re: Magdalenian experiment (continuation)

Indus seals (part 8)

Rectangle with a pole on top --- store house, often
a granary

Lens, rarely a full circle --- oven

Tree consiting of a trunk, a slanting branch, and three
twigs slanting to the other side --- firewood. This sign
(with a short trunk only) sometimes appears in a lens,
indicating firewood in an oven

High standing triangle --- smoking chamber, for example
used for smoking fish

A cross in the form of an X with one side closed and
the other side open but the ends of the cross enhanced
with 'thorns' --- bellows for kindling the fire in an oven,
since that sign sometimes lies over a lens, and in other
cases appears with flags for wind, moving air. As the
sign also occurs before a man (seal of the Lord of the
Animals or rather Year) it must have the additional
meaning of cooling, causing draught in a house by
opening the right doors and windows while closing
others, consider the "sweet wind from the north"
used by the Egyptians in order too cool their tents
and houses

A cross in the form of an X with one side closed by
a vertical stroke while the angle of the cross on the
other side is made broader, stronger --- warming and
heating a house by generating a warm stream using
the hot air above a fire (the Harappans may not only
have used water tubes but also heating tubes
conducting warm air)

(to be continued)

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Indus seals (part 7)

Now for some of the ideograms above the animals:

Jar, basically an U --- provisions

Fish --- important in the Harappan diet. Fish broth
was consumed as an aphrodisiac. The extra signs
may indicate how the fish lived, was caught, and
processed. An angle above or rather before the
head may indicate that the fish lived in a pond;
two parallel wavy lines next to it may indicate
wild fish from a river; arrow heads sticking in the
gills may indicate speared fish; a horizonal halving
stroke may indicate fish cut in pieces; and so on

Asymmetrical jar, with a slanting substance at the
bottom --- fish sauce or paste, comparable to the
popular Roman garum, tasty, rich in protein, not
perishable, and easily transportable. Garum was
fermented tuna cut in pieces, but fish sauce or
paste was also made by fermenting small fish
in jars. Fish sauce or paste is indicated when
the asymmetrical jar sign appears in between
a fish and an arrow or lance

Arrow-head on a shaft --- arrow, spear, lance,
as verb to catch, also spearing fish

Mortar and pestle --- as verb to grind, cereals
into flour, also dried fish to flakes and powder.
Fish meal, still being produced in India, could
have been added to soup, an instant fish broth,
as it were. It may also have been used as
animal feed, and as fertilizer, especially when
it got rancid. The meaning of fish meal is indicated
when the mortar and pestel occur in combination
with fish and an arrow-head on a shaft (spear or
lance)

Two short vertical strokes at the top --- exposing
to sun and air, drying fish or bricks or herbs

Horizontal boards fixed to a pole --- rack for drying
fish or bricks or herbs

(to be continued)

-

Indus seals (part 6)

Buildings --- the incised copper tablet M-522 shows
three buildings with a hint of perspective, a store
house in form of a rectangle with a pole on top and
perhaps a flag blowing to the left side, in the middle
a palace with two flags blowing to the left side,
and a family house in form of a grid 4 x 3. The tops
are slightly narrower than the bases, making the
buildings appear in the perspective of someone
walking on the street. The drawing of the palace is
identical with the ideogram of the palace, basically
our H with additional vertical and horizontal strokes,
the under half is the building, the upper parts of the
vertical side lines are flag poles (more later, also
the humorous analogy of palace and dog honoring
an excellent guard who did as good a job as a
watchdog)

Royal barque, M-1349 and bis --- the cabins of these
ships resemble the palace ideogram, hence these are
royal barques, in the cabins are two high boards on
which appear sequences of triangular objects that
may be specially formed bricks, for example used
for window frames in the form of a pipal leaf, bricks
being indicated by the grids on the backsides, and
these bricks of a high quality produced in a specialized
manufacture would have been shipped to palaces all
along the many rivers

(to be continued)

-

Indus seals (part 5)

Pipal tree (ficus religiosa) --- Harappan tree of life,
associated with the horned goddess and the horned
god whose symbolical marriage may have been
celebrated in the temple of the tree in downtown
Mohenjo-daro

Leaf of the pipal tree, also a heart, also three circles
or dots or lines, also a trefoil --- life, health, and
offspring. Consider the trefoils on the robe of the
priest-king from Mohenjo-daro, on the linga-stand
from Mohenjo-daro, and on the fragment of a steatite
statuette of a bull from Mohenjo-daro

Manger, wicker-basket, feed position before a buffaöo
--- indicating that bulls were domesticated, even gaurs,
and used for heavy work such as dragging a plough,
a sledge of bricks, or a cart

Standard before a bull, most often a 'unicorn',
sometimes also a rhinoceros, a pole with an often
dotted bowl and above a grid --- harvest in double
form, real harvest of grains, and metaphorical
'harvest' of bricks. Rectangular grids indicate
regular bricks; zigzag or undulating patterns or
a dome indicate special bricks, for example round
ones needed for tubes. In one case the bowl is
replaced by a dough or a bread in conic form
resembling Egyptian bread,, while the grid above
is replaced by a lump of clay hanging down on
both sides, together an appealing plastic shape
(M-741)

(to be continued)

.

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    ... My other main hobbys are riding my motorcycle, which I actually use to pick up fish and corals and vist fish store around the NYC/NJ area, through I don't ride as much as I use to. ... And I collect X-mas house, which is a hobby I do around X-mas of course. ... "I spend alot of time on my computer and with all the fish tanks it does take up alot of my time but I make sure there is always time to drink." ...
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