Arkan-na said, “Your spear entered a lung. You will have blood placed on your forehead because you were part of the kill and it’s your first. You will wear it on your forehead until Wisdom begins to suck color from the land. Then you will wash it off. It is the way of the People. It is not something you discuss. Just do as I have said.” Being careful not to foster pride, he would not tell Yomuk that almost never was a youngster blooded with aurochs blood. Usually, it was deer. Yomuk was very strong and precise in his thrust for someone his age. Arkan-na approved in silence.
Yomuk followed Arkan-na to the side of the aurochs. He tried hard to push down the pride he felt in his good spear thrust. His dark, shining hair was loosed from his headband and blew in the breeze. His leather piece had slid down somewhat. The leather strip that circled his waist and held the wider strip of leather had stretched. Appearance had not entered his mind web. His total focus was to absorb everything about the hunt and ignore all else.
Arkan-na noticed Yomuk’s loose clothing. He grasped the narrow leather strip at Yomuk’s hip and said with a smile, “You might want to tighten this before you are unclothed.”
Yomuk blushed and stopped to tighten his leather strip and pull up his wide leather covering. He thanked Arkan-na. Yomuk felt for his headband. He had lost it. His eyes scanned the scene and he saw it just uphill. He retrieved it and pulled it over his head to keep the hair out of his eyes.
Guy-na said, “We almost have the beast headed downhill. I will run to let hunters know to stop their hunt, so they can come here to help. I will also notify women at the home cave that we have an aurochs.” He knew that he was likely the quickest runner, except for Yomuk, but Yomuk was too young for the responsibility and the boy needed to learn butchering. Hunters nodded at his words. He left at a run.
Arkan-na pulled Yomuk’s spear from the animal. He removed Yomuk’s headband and wiped the spear point across the young man’s forehead. Then, he returned the spear and headband to Yomuk. The youngster put it back on despite the fresh blood on his forehead. He would clean the headband later. Arkan-na removed the remaining spears from the aurochs. The other hunters had already had a first kill, so the only one blooded was Yomuk. Arkan-na pulled a sharp blade from his backpack. He cut the arteries and blood flowed downhill from the animal.
He looked at Yomuk. “We have to get the blood out so it doesn’t spoil the meat.” Yomuk nodded. His father had explained the procedure, but his father was not a hunter. He paid more attention to hunters than to his father on hunting matters. He wanted to be a hunter like his uncle, Manak-na.
Meeluf, Ekoy, and Yomuk had already turned the animal onto its back, after many attempts and having to move the head of the aurochs. It lay a bit off perpendicular to the downhill slope. The animal bled out as well as could be hoped for on the slant where it lay. The two men at the hindquarters began to pull the legs forward to lift the back end, if they could. They were unable to lift it. Normally, they hung deer and smaller animals from trees to bleed them. Hunters took the legs of the aurochs and moved them as if the animal moved. By holding the legs up and moving them, the blood drained from the legs so it could exit the body of the aurochs. Arkan-na told them he would open the gut and that the intestines would roll out. He warned Yomuk without calling him by name that the interior of the beast would likely not smell very pleasant. He wanted them to hold the beast in its current position and then to catch the neck of the gut at the top of the first stomach. Ekoy volunteered to clasp it. Yomuk watched carefully. He didn’t know what the first stomach on an aurochs looked like or where it was placed. He watched everything carefully. Off and on pride filled him with warmth when he thought of his spear thrust delivering a killing strike.
“You’ll need to keep it so nothing leaks out,” Arkan-na said.
“I understand,” Ekoy replied.
Arkan-na began to slice into the beast. Yomuk thought he’d been nauseated before, but this odor was far worse. He gagged.
Arkan-na said sternly, “I warned you, Yomuk. You cannot get sick now. You have to hold the beast.”
Yomuk wanted to cry but quickly reasoned that was not an appropriate response. He tried not breathing, but that wouldn’t work. Finally, he continued to breathe and make himself well aware that vomiting was not an option. It was difficult! He remembered the bee stings. This is another part of what it means to be a man? he pondered.
Arkan-na had cut the beast from under the neck to and around the rectum where he held the contents from leaking. Ekoy had done a great job of holding the stomach. Meanwhile the intestines had rolled outside of the animal and looked like a giant gray snake to Yomuk. He was fascinated and completely repulsed. His belly still threatened to heave.
Arkan-na told the young men they had to move the intestines away from the body of the aurochs. They used tree trunks that they’d already used as levers, while others held the ends of the gut tight to prevent leakage. For heavier parts of the animal they gained leverage by using more than one trunk of a tree from the forest, still safeguarding their spears from usage that could damage them. They would have to clean out the intestines, so they would become useful as containers that wouldn’t leak, but that required very careful cleaning first. They had to be cleaned away from the aurochs so they wouldn’t contaminate it with the awful contents. All four of them moved the intestines from the aurochs, cut the intestines into a man’s arm length, and carried them away to a nearby creek to wash them thoroughly.
Arkan-na began the skin separation process. He had the younger men turn the body of the aurochs when he needed to reach something he could not otherwise reach. Yomuk participated here rather than cleaning intestines. Occasionally, the turning required use of levers with rocks underneath to make the aurochs roll as desired. Ekoy had found a stick to use that was stronger than his spear, which he chose to protect at all costs. Arkan-na wanted to assure that they got as whole a skin as possible, so moving the beast was required. Women made wonderful things of a skin and this was a very large one of excellent quality.
By the time the skin had been removed, Ekoy looked up and noticed that hunters and women were approaching. Once they arrived, the work went faster. Women gathered hands full of damp grass and wiped down the hindquarters which had been cut off first. It took two men to carry one hindquarter to the meat preparation cave. They could have used a third man. A roast was sent to the home cave. The skin was rolled and carried by Kai-na and Ermi-na to an old skin where it was securely wrapped. The hauling skin had two strips of leather attached. The men pulled the fresh wrapped skin bundle across grass to transport it to the meat preparation cave for processing. Slamika-na and Manak-na carried the second hindquarter to the pond where they submerged it at the pond’s far end. To keep it underwater, they piled rocks on top of it. The intestines had been cut into arm length strips and washed in the creek. The bladder and stomachs were separated and cleaned. Then, they were taken to the meat preparation cave for final work. Little by little the body was butchered and when Wisdom began to suck the color from the land, they had finished and those involved in the day’s butchering were enjoying a celebratory bath at the meat preparation cave. Yomuk had washed the blood from his forehead and carefully cleaned his headband.
Poles had been brought from the home cave and from the trees the men had felled earlier in the day. The meat preparation cave was clearly ready for use. Skin stretchers needed to be assembled, but the major work was finished. The hunters who would be working late in the meat preparation cave went to eat so they could return to process and guard the meat into the night. They brought oil lamps so they could see in the dark cave.
While they were eating, Manak-na passed by Yomuk, putting his hand on the boy’s shoulder. Yomuk looked up at his uncle. Without a word, Manak-na made it clear that he heartily approved his nephew. Yomuk lowered his head. He was so grateful that he’d been able to keep his food in his belly during the butchering. His uncle’s approval meant everything to him. He knew his father could not be
a hunter, and he wanted hunter approval—most of all from Manak-na.
Back at the new home cave, Ki’ti walked outside with a small basket on her arm, and, seemingly without thought, began to follow a deer trail that went uphill from the flat land. Tiriku trotted at her heels. Ki’ti examined the vegetation for herbs they might want for food seasoning or healing. She was feeling worrisomely agitated. Ever since she had taught directly at the camp, she had been unsure of herself. It concerned her greatly. She did not want to go outside the boundaries that Wamumur and Emaea had set for Wise Ones. She wanted to be a creditable Wise One, and she felt extraordinary failure. Untuk-na had tried to reason her out of it, but it didn’t help. She was harder on herself than anyone else ever could be.
Untuk-na saw her leave the cave and followed at a respectful distance. He knew she was thinking about many things, and he had no desire to interrupt. He was, however, charged to keep her safe.
Ki’ti saw several medicinal herbs and placed them in the basket, her hands functioning automatically, while her thoughts were more theoretical. She thought of Yomuk, so young and yet so tall. He wanted to be a great hunter and seemed to worship his uncle Manak-na. She felt that sometimes he was disrespectful of his own father, who could not hunt. Untuk-na had been a great hunter before they joined. He had saved her life when the creek water swept her away. But, Ki’ti thought, what mattered to Yomuk was hunting, the bigger the beast the better. He had a pride problem like she had long ago. She wondered whether it was as large a problem. And then there was Elemaea. The child was impulsive just as she’d been. She was getting a little old to be doing impulsive things, she felt, until she realized how old she’d been when she disobeyed and left for the cave of the man with the green bag. She worried about the lack of a new Wise One. Who would it be? Would there be time to teach that person all a Wise One needed to know? Her mind raced. She also knew that the Mol who joined them just as they were leaving were not adapting well to the group. They had different customs. They had a chief who issued orders. Each person was not expected to think and to reason for himself or herself. The Mol had been in one place for so long that they didn’t understand the need for a group on trek to act as a tight unit, tied by understanding the group as well as themselves.
Ki’ti looked up and noticed some more pine trees. They formed rows where trees were just offset from each other so as to provide a barrier to sight. The straight lines fascinated her. Obviously, a person had set them to grow in lines. She continued walking very quietly, trailed by Tiriku, who was leaping and jumping over obstacles. Her senses were acute, but nothing gave her any indication that life existed here. Untuk-na moved up to her quickly.
He put his arm on her shoulder. “Wait,” he cautioned. “Let me go into the cave first.”
She looked at him, jarred from her thoughts. “Of course,” she agreed. Tiriku continued behind her making more effort the steeper the path became. When Ki’ti stopped, he sat. She looked down at her dog with a smile.
Untuk-na wasn’t long in his cave examination.
“Come, Ki’ti, this is most unusual,” he called.
Ki’ti followed the trail upwards, crossing behind the trees to the cave. It was small with a high ceiling. In the cave there was a large slab that was made when the walls were chipped away. On the slab were a number of items laid out in straight lines: a piece of green rock, highly polished, and shaped like a snake or dragon—she was unsure which; a piece of quartz with flecks of gold embedded; a purple shell with holes at the edge, which she assumed correctly was the item that caused the friction in the Maknu-na and Rimlad story; a leg bone that was longer than she was tall, could not be encircled by her hands or Untuk-na’s, and felt like rock rather than bone; a piece of rock that had been split that sparkled with fire when she licked her finger and ran it over the flat surface; a very large conch shell that tasted of salt and made a sound when placed by the ear; a bone flute that played beautiful sounds; a curved horn-like thing that looked like an elephant’s tusk, but this one was almost as tall as she, and it curved almost back into itself; a wooden carved woman who was fatter than anyone Ki’ti’d ever seen and had huge breasts and feet so small proportionately that they’d never hold her up; a pile of claws from various animals and birds; a flat long stone that had scratches in it; a stone that had what looked like dark plants as part of the stone, causing her to wonder whether plants grew inside stones.
Ki’ti looked at Untuk-na speechless. Both had examined the items. Both realized this was something special but had no idea what they were viewing. Finally, Ki’ti asked, “Will you look out the windows and tell me what you see?”
Untuk-na picked up a rock and set it before the window so he could stand on it to see outside. He did the same with each of the three windows. It felt odd to him to have to use a rock to gain height to look out of a window. He realized in an instant how life must be for Ki’ti with her lack of height. Before he experienced it himself, he had no idea. “Each window frames a hilltop,” he said quietly.
“What would be the purpose of that?” she asked.
“I don’t know unless this area used to be home to many people and they communicated by setting fires atop the hills to send messages. I suppose it could have been used to have some sense of when a seasonal change would occur if the sun, moon, or a star topped the hill on a certain day. It could have many uses, but, really, I have no idea.”
“There’s no feeling of people in here,” Ki’ti remarked. “I do think it important to leave these items as we found them. They obviously were placed as they were for a purpose.”
“My Dear Ki’ti, whoever placed these things did so a very long time ago. Look at the accumulation of dust in here. This place has been untouched for lifetimes. Probably nobody on the earth knows this place exists!”
“It may exist in stories,” Ki’ti rejoined. “Look at the purple shell with the holes. That is what the People at the time of Maknu-na and Rimlad were fighting over.”
“Now that you mention it, I agree totally. What wonderful dippers they’d be! Why, do you think, someone would leave these things lying here like this?”
“It seems that they are special things to someone. I’m thinking that they may have known Wisdom. Maybe they felt that they should offer something special to Wisdom. Could this be a place where they put offerings or sacrifices to Wisdom?”
“Ki’ti, that’s your world, not mine. I think we should talk about this at the men’s council tonight and suggest that people leave things here as we found them. If they were given to Wisdom, it would be terrible to take them or break one. We surely have no right to them.”
“More direct teaching?”
“Well, how else would you get them to leave things as they are?”
Ki’ti smiled and chuckled lightly. She smiled her special smile for him.
Ki’ti sat on the edge of the stone slab. Tiriku came to sit beside her, his tongue hanging from his mouth. He looked back and forth from Ki’ti to Untuk-na resting with his ears back and eyes protruded. Untuk-na noticed him and almost laughed aloud, but cut the laughter away when he noticed Ki’ti was deep in thought. Their ways were changing, she mused, and there seemed nothing she could do to slow the rate of change. She would have to address the issue directly and definitely that night. Another direct teaching experience! It made her terribly uneasy, as if she were breaking some long established rule. Determined, she rose and reached for Untuk-na’s hand. As they began to exit the cave they saw Nanichak-na coming up the path.
“What are you two doing here?” he asked resting his hand on the wall of the entryway.
“Ha,” Untuk-na laughed, “We could ask you the same thing.”
“Manak-na and I were talking about how the pines on this hill seem to have been put where they are intentionally. These outside this cave are placed in lines! All seem to mark something. Is this cave interesting?”
Ki’ti smiled. “Come in and look for yourself.” Tiriku had stood up eagerly when Ki’ti
did. He sat back down with a look of resignation.
Nanichak-na entered and drew in a breath that made a sound. “I suppose it is interesting!” he said, “I suppose it is.” He carefully examined the items on the stone slab.
“It almost seems that they are laid there as a gift to Wisdom,” Ki’ti said. “I feel that the People should be warned not to take anything from here or put the items in places different from where they are. There is something too special about all this. It’s almost disturbing.”
Nanichak-na looked more carefully at the items. “Look at this! It’s the Maknu-na and Rimlad story?”
“I think you’re right,” Ki’ti said.
“You’ll speak of this at the men’s council?” Nanichak-na asked.
“Yes,” Ki’ti replied. “I admit I feel strange speaking out directly to the People.”
“Ah, Ki’ti, hunters do it all the time. There is a time when it’s critical—as it was the other day at the camp when Humko-na was being teased. It’s done to get attention focused closely so that the hearer doesn’t lose the message or get it confused. When you speak out directly, the message is clear to all. There is no way to find little cracks like you used to find to avoid doing what was expected. If you did it all the time, People wouldn’t hear you, but when you do it seldom, it gets attention effectively.”
Ki’ti laughed at the memory. “Nanichak-na, Great Hunter, thank you from the bottom of my belly. I had been worrying and causing myself endless frustration about speaking out. I didn’t realize that there are times when it is appropriate.”
Untuk-na felt a great sense of relief. He was certain what Ki’ti had done was necessary and appropriate, but he had been Mol and wondered whether he was missing something when he tried to calm her about it. He knew that Nanichak-na had just handed her the means of relaxing finally. He was grateful.
“Let’s go down,” Untuk-na suggested, “It should be time for the evening meal.”
Manak-na's Story, 75,000 BC Page 7