4) Key

I can hear you: all right, we see the connection between institutions, feasting and decay, but what does this have to do with your introduction about assembly, fragmentation, centralization, and decentralization? And, above all, what does this have to do with the stake from the previous video?

What? Haven't you made the connection yet? The solution has been staring you in the face all along. I'll give you a few moments to exercise your powers of observation.

Still nothing? The key to « ShaTa » is the BooTh, the HuT. Yes, the ṢuKowt booth. Sorry? Don't you know ṢuKowt? ṢuKowt, the FeSTival of booths, or huts, which just ended, doesn't ring a bell? Really, ṢuKowt is the ultimate festival. God knows the Jewish calendar is full of FeSTivities but the only one that really matters is ṢuKowt. After all, ṢuKowt is THE Paleolithic holiday, when we celebrate our ancestors who lived and slept in huts.

Still don't see the connection? Okay, remember my video on the Neolithic Revolution, « Ère d’abondance ? De la divergence à la complexité ». Our species SeTTLed only gradually. Even at the beginning of the Neolithic Revolution, our ancestors only GaTheRed temporarily, during the HaRVeST SeaSoN. The rest of the year, they lived in small GRouPs scattered over vast territories.

For instance, it is reckoned that around 400,000 years ago, there were only between 13,000 and 25,000 Neanderthals in the whole of Western Europe. And after the arrival of Homo Sapiens, the density in Western Europe remained extremely low until the very end of the Paleolithic: 12,000 years ago, the estimated population only numbered some 6,600.

Understanding this relationship to space is important: Europe was empty of humans and full of animals, and the few people who lived there knew virtually everyone. It's difficult to picture, but it's true, even if stupid Pharisian linguists will argue that these 6,600 people all spoke different languages. Sheesh ... Thus, to preserve their Ties despite immense DiSTances, they GaTheRed at regular intervals for FeSTivities, in HuTs where they lived during the winter.

Bear in mind that for tens of thousands of years, the attitude towards settling was ambivalent: regrouping and experiencing things toGeTheR was undeniably attractive, but on the other hand, CoMMuNal life was rather difficult, conflicts were frequent, and above all, everything quickly became DiRTy. This ambivalence has remained at the heart of language, as we've just seen with the semantic fields of FeaST and DiRT. This explains why anything STaying STiLL for too long gets dirty, like STaGNant waters, from STaGNo in Latin.

Even today, the French say « PLaNTer le CaMP » (to SeT up CaMP) and « FouTRe le camp » (to « FuCk up camp », meaning to get the hell out). You can set up camp (« ShaTa ») and fuck it up (« ShaTa » again) to eSCaPe. For hundreds of thousands of years, we only truly lived ouTDooRs, in the WiND. And when the fine WeaTheR returned, at the SPRiNG eQuiNoX, the call of the open aiR was irresistible. This call to go back outdoors explains why spring CLeaNing, or eaSTeR cleaning, happens in the spring. This tension between the purifying air, « Ra », and the still dirt, « ShaTa », is another example of the fundamental oPPoSition between « Ra » and « ShaTa », mentioned in my previous video.

« ShaTa » is the story of humanity's gradual, but above all ambivalent, SeTTLing process. A story that started two million years ago, when our ancestors began WanDeRing the SaVaNNah. A story that begins with SeT, the third son of ʔaDaM, born after the murder of HaBeL by his brother QayiN; SeT, whose generation was the first to begin praying to the name of the Eternal, as the Bible tells in Genesis, chapter 4, verse 26.

The notion of settled life embodied by « ShaTa » is found in the verb « to STay » (which means both to STaND firm, to stand upright, and to ReMaiN in one PLaCe) and above all in « settle » (to eSTaBLish one's ReSiDence) and is related to the Old French eSTal (featured in PeDeSTal). For the Yiddish literates, I must mention the Shtetl, the mythical Eastern European Jewish villages wiped out in the Holocaust.

In Greek, « ShaTa » is found in aSTu, the CiTy, in STaṬmos, the STaBLe, the PoST, the SToP, the LoDGing, and which also, interestingly, conveys the idea of BaLanCe, or eQuiLiBRium between 2 STaTes - reminiscent of the ambivalence and SeaSoNal aLTeRNance between NoMaDic and SeDentary lifestyles. It is also present in STeP, from STaPes, the STiRRuP where the FooT ReSTs. The foot that SiNKs into the ground when you take a step, STéiBô in Greek.

Now you can see why « ShaTa » appears in the CoMMeNSality of the FeaST. Paleolithic GaTheRings always featured FeSTivities celebrating the great HuNTs (especially that of the Mammoth) and iNViTed NeiGhBoRing CoMMuNities to ShaRe the GaMe.

For hundreds of thousands of years, our ancestors all had the same dream: to live a ComFoRTable, STaTioNary life, with FooD within eaSy ReaCh. In other words, PaRaDiSe! The Qur'an - a major text born from a predominantly NoMaDic culture - features traces of this dream, notably in the description of Paradise, GaN!at in Arabic, in Sura 88, Al ĠaʔShyat, the Overwhelming, in verses 8 to 16:

« On that Day other faces will be glowing with bliss, fully pleased with their striving, in an elevated GaRDeN, where no idle talk will be heard. In it will be a RuNNing SPRiNG, along with ThRoNes RaiSed high, and CuPs SeT at hand, and fine˺ CuShioNs LiNed up, and splendid CaRPeTs SPReaD out. »

Or, in the words of Beaudelaire, « There, all is oRDeR and Beauty, luxury, peace, and pleasure », in contrast to the TiResome NoMaDic life. Jacqueline Chabbi, the great Islam anthropologist, in her book « Les trois piliers de l'Islam » (The Three Pillars of Islam), wrote:

« Indeed, those admitted to the GaN!at are promised a veritable elixir of SeTTLed life for having fulfilled their obligations of solidarity in this world. The STay of the ChoSen ones is totally non-TRaVeLLing. It thus offers a STaRK ConTRaST to their earthly life, entirely shaped by the need to find GooD GuiDance. This vital earthly function, which used to be a constant and haunting obsession, disappears completely in Paradise, as if the men received there had reached a final DeSTiNation and no longer needed to be continually on the lookout for a DiReCTion to FoLLoW. They somehow witness the complete disappearance of everything on Earth that was a source of great DaNGeR. The paradisiacal GaN!at is therefore a PLaCe of ReST in the strongest sense of the word. ».

Now you see why everyone in the Paleolithic era waited eagerly for the month of TiShRy, the SeVeNth month, the month of FeaSTing, ReST, and SaTieTy. You also understand why, in the Torah, the seventh year is not only the year of the ShMyṬah, the FaLLoW year, the year when the land is let to rest, but more importantly the year of the haQheL, the great gathering, which Moses instituted in Deuteronomy, chapter 31 verse 10, and which was to begin right after the end of ṢuKowt. Let me read to you: « At the end of every seven years, at the time of ShMyṬah (the fallow year), at the FeSTival of ṢuKowt, when all Israel comes to appear before the Lord your God at the PLaCe that he will ChooSe, you shall read this LaW before all Israel in their hearing. »

And lastly, you now also understand why ṢuKowt, the festival of the BooThs, is called ḤaG haʔaṢiF, the festival of inGaTheRing. Indeed ṢuKowt, before it became the moment of SToRing the HaRVeST into the GRaNaries to get through the cold SeaSoN, was the time when families came together after having SPent the good season aPaRT.

Speaking of HaRVeSTs and GRaNaries, I explained in my video on the Neolithic Revolution that the SeTTLing process always came with some form of storage, however temporary. That's why « ShaTa » appears in the verb « to SToRe » (eSToRer in Old French).

During the good season, some of the meat or fish was gradually PReSeRVed, especially through STeWing, and SToRed to LaST through the BaD season. This seasonal PaTTeRN is particularly well documented in the Qur'an, again in Sura 94 As ShaRḤ, the opening, which twice repeats « Verily, along with every HaRDship is reLieF, »

Speaking of storage, let's talk about the verb « to ReSToRe ». In French, ReSTauRer has two meanings: to eaT (hence reSTauRant), but also, like in English, to restore, reBuiLD, reConSTRuCT. Indeed, the HuTs abandoned during the good season had to be STRaiGhTened, by STiCking the WoBBLy STaKes back into the ground and TiDying the ThaTChed RooFs.

The Latin doublet inSTauRo and reSTauRo (to iNSTaLL and to restore) also refers to this seasonal pattern, derived from the Latin SaTio (season) that we've just seen, and which also appears in SoLSTiCe, the moment when the SuN STaNDs STiLL, aeSTas (SuMMeR), or in the French TôT (the right time, SooN).

This notion of the right time, of the right, or good season, is also found in the ceremony of LuSTRation, (from LuSTRum in Latin), a purification with light performed every 5 years after the CeNSus, and which the French language has kept in the expression: « ça fait des LuSTRes » (it's been ages: it's been LuSTRums). I'll come back in my next video to the CeNSus – essential in Paleolithic culture.