Tag: hunter

winter haiku d’hiver – the wolverine = le carcajou


winter haiku d'hiver – the wolverine = le carcajou




the wolverine
dashing through the snow
deals a nasty blow

le carcajou
qui file à travers la neige
porte un coup cruel

Richard Vallance

photo public domain

Wolverines are vicious hunters. Les carcajous sont des chasseurs vicieux.
Advertisement

winter haiku d’hiver – the bounty hunter = le chasseur de primes


winter haiku d'hiver – the bounty hunter = le chasseur de primes




the bounty hunter
snares a wight fox pup
snapped in half

le chasseur de primes
piège un chiot renard blanc
craqué en deux 

Richard Vallance

NOTE: I fully realize that haiku such as this one probably disgust some of you folks, but I am trying to wake you up to human cruelty and our destruction of wildlife.

Je me rends compte du fait que des haiku tels que celui-ci peuvent écoureur plusieurs parmi vous, mais je tente de vous réveiller à la cruauté humaine et à notre destruction de la faune sauvage.

I Argentée


I Argentee 620

I Argentée

I Argentée have lived a hardy life:
a Maine Coon mix, I’ve forded babbling rills,
the freest spirit, who’s never suffered strife!
Why, I have scaled formidable forest hills,
where I’ve run into coons and surly bears
who’ve never phased me in the very least;
I’ve roamed the fields and sounded foxes’ lairs,
so why be so surprised when I am deceased.
Because I pride the space I always crave,
although I was on leash, the leash was loose,
to leave me running free, for being brave,
since as you know I’ve always been so spruce!
For all the bugs I’ve chased and mice I’ve caught
I bid you, fairest friends, to mourn me not.

Richard Vallance

March 29 2019

in memoriam, fairest Argentée, libre esprit (free spirit)
April 15 2003 – March 14 2019

winter haiku – fresh snow on the wolf’s brow = nouvelle neige sur le front du loup


winter haiku – fresh snow on the wolf’s brow = nouvelle neige sur le front du loup

fresh snow
on the wolf’s brow –
killer blue eyes

haiku snow on the wolfs brow

nouvelle neige
sur le front du loup –
yeux bleus meurtriers

Richard Vallance

winter haiku d’hiver – chickadees = mésanges à tête noire


winter haiku d’hiver – chickadees = mésanges à tête noire 

there in the spruce tree
mocking chickadees -
prowling wolverine


wolverine

perchés dans le sapin
mésanges à tête noire -
carcajou rôdant

Richard Vallance

Another Linear A tablet bites the dust… Troullos TL Za 1… horsemanship and hunting


 

Another Linear A tablet bites the dust… Troullos TL Za 1… horsemanship and hunting:

Troullos tablet TL Za 1

This tablet or nodule completely eluded me for over 2 years. Then tonight, all of sudden, its meaning literally burst wide open. The first hint came when I began to decipher the obvious Linear words, all of which happen to be Mycenaean-derived New Minoan NM1. The most obvious word, which stands out like a sore thumb, is WAJA = #ai/a in Mycenaean-derived Greek, in other words land. The rest of the Mycenaean-derived words were more difficult to extract from the agglutinated text, since in an agglutinative language such as Minoan, words which would otherwise be separate in a fusional or inflected language, such as ancient or modern Greek or German, are simply strung together in long strings. So it is difficult to know where one word ends and another begins … but far from impossible. Because so many words on this tablet are agglutinated, it presents a particularly challenging target for decipherment. But decipher it I did, as you can see below.

If we break apart the agglutinated words, meanings start to surface. For instance, ATAI*301 appears to mean 0astai= from oastei=a, meaning of the town, community.

Moving on, we have QARE0 = ba/lei ba/loj = at the threshold (locative singular). For the time being, I do not know what OSU, which is almost certainly Old Minoan, means but I am confident I shall soon figure it out. If we then decipher the first 2 agglutinated words ATA*301WAJA. OSUQARE, we get something along these lines (OSU being omitted for the time being), on the … threshold of community of town, i.e. “on the … outskirts of the community or town”

The the next two agglutinated words are UNAKANASI. UNA is Old Minoan. KANASI is instrumental plural Mycenaean-derived New Minoan (NM1) for ka/nnasi (instr. plural) = made of reeds, i.e. wicker. This almost certainly refers to the chariot itself, which like almost all Mycenaean chariots, is probably made of wicker, as illustrated below. If my hunch is correct, given that KANASI means made of wicker, then UNA must necessarily mean chariot, hence a chariot made of wicker. Remember: UNAKANASI is a composite agglutination of 2 words, first Old Minoan (UNA) and the second Mycenaean-derived New Minoan (NM1) = KANASI.

Troullos tablet original with Mycenaean horse and chariot and modern horse halter

IPINAMASIRUTE is another agglutination, this time consisting of 3 words, all of them Mycenaean-derived New Minoan (NM1). The tablet or nodule above provides us with the full translation, which in its actual order reads, with horsemanship + running + (towards) prey. In other words, we have a charioteer, whose name is JASASARAME, clearly a highly skilled charioteer and hunter, whose ridership or horsemanship allows him to run towards his prey, and at a fast pace at that, given that NAMA always refers to something flowing fast, usually a stream, but in this context, clearly horses, 2 of them, of course, since Mycenaean chariots always have two horses.

So the free translation runs along these lines, and very well indeed,

Jasasarame, the hunter-charioteer, in his chariot made of wicker, is exercising his (considerable) ridership skills, by running at break-neck speed (or: running by a stream) towards the wild prey he is hunting on the outskirts of his town (community).

This decipherment, which is almost entirely in Mycenaean-derived New Minoan (NM1) hangs together admirably well. It is a major breakthrough in the ongoing saga of the decipherment of Linear A. It is also buttressed by the fact that the tablet or nodule actually looks like a horses halter. While the word halter appears, at least at first sight, not to figure in the text, this is of little consequence. The tablet itself makes it quite clear enough that here we have two horses (always two with Mycenaean chariots) and that a well-heeled, and most likely aristocratic or warrior-class charioteer, Jasasarame, is at the reins.

I rest my case.