Dead Languages; Literally, "Apu-Punchau"? and Glyphs,

Mark Millman · 02 Apr 1999, 08:56 · from urth-v0024.mbox · original

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From: "Mark Millman" <Mark_Millman at hmco.com>
Subject: Re: (urth) Dead Languages; Literally, "Apu-Punchau"? and Glyphs,
Date: Fri, 2 Apr 1999 08:56:58
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On Friday 2 April 1999 at 5:47 am GMT, Mitchell A. Bailey wrote:

> [snip]
>
> Until some points made in the recent "Thorn"
> discussions, however, it never occured to me
> to question the literal authenticity of the name
> "Apu-Punchau". The name is Quechua, the
> tongue of the Incas of Peru, and means roughly
> "Lord Sun-God". I'm not a Quechua scholar, but
> I am interested enough to own a book which
> includes a Quechua glossary.
>
> I'm wondering if the use of Quechua is a sub-
> stitution of the same sort for some future auto-
> chthonous language, or whether Sev actually
> traveled back in time to live among the pre-
> imperial Inca, c. 1200 AD?
>
> [snip]

My guess would be (and from this I'm sure that you can tell I tend
toward the conservative in Wolfean criticism) that your first sug-
gestion (i.e., that Quechua is a stand-in for some post-historic
language) is the correct explanation.  If the cities of the twentieth
century are vanished into dust, I think it unlikely--though I admit not
impossible--that any Incan city would remain to serve at the Stone
Town.  Furthermore, if there had been an "unscheduled" (so to
speak) total solar eclipse in the twelfth or thirteenth centuries, I'd
imagine there would be some sort of record of it.  Even if Tzadkiel
had managed the Ship so that the eclipse were seen only in the
Western Hemisphere, we could expect the Maya to have recog-
nized it as unusual and to have recorded it, though of course the
Inca or proto-Inca wouldn't have left such a record.  I suppose it's
possible that the Ship was so located that the eclipse was strictly
local, but I don't think this likely; I'd argue for greater Ship size
and distance from Urth during the eclipse, as mantis discussed
yesterday.

In other news, on Friday 2 April 1999 at 4:35 am GMT, Roy C. Lackey
wrote:

> While we're at it, these "glyphs" from "The Tale of
> the Rose and the Nightingale (And What Came of It)":
>
> "...a bent object that might be a whip, a human leg
> and a foot, a shallow cup, and a crocodile."

The story, if I recall correctly, is set in Egypt, so these could actually
be classical hieroglyphs and look very much as they're described,
rather than merely being suggestive of objects, as S, T, and Mr.
Ansley's letters (which I won't give away) are.

And Mr. Lloyd, welcome to the list!  Your explication is an excellent
one, especially for someone like me who, ah, doesn't necessarily
recognize Christian themes without a little prompting.  That's not to
say that I agree completely (I don't see Kevin Malone as being very
much the willing servant; his attitude smacks more of an assumed,
and false, humility to me), but then on this list, who does?

Mark Millman

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