5) Key

Right, then. Let's stop here for a moment. You'll remember how in my previous video I explained that, in my opinion, « Ta Ra » was the word of PaRTing and ShaRing, of CuTTing, TRanChing and SLiCing ; I've been harping on about it for years. The problem with this theory is that the notion of « TuRNing » present in « TouR » has nothing to do with cutting.

Even if we can connect parting with exploration - through those much talked about butchery sites - it's much harder to connect the idea of slicing with iTeRation, and above all, with turning. And yet, this sense of « turning » present in « Ta Ra » is central, for it's found in Hebrew, Egyptian, Akkadian, Greek and Latin.

I was obsessed with this for a good part of the summer of 2022. I searched and searched. And then one day, as usual, an epiphany. éuRèKa. I had become too fixated on the idea of parting and cutting up the animal's CaRCaSS. And I had missed the point, which had been right in front of me all along, even before I became a Paleolithic specialist.

Don't you see? It's been right in front of you all along too... I'll give you a few seconds to exercise your powers of observation. Not yet. FLiNT. That's right, flint. Flint is cut - or rather, ChoPPed- like animal carcasses.

The flint that we TuRN and FLiP, to find the best aNGLe to STRiKe it, until it takes on that marvellous BiFaCial ShaPe - or FoRM. The flint that is first « HaRVeSTed » in special places, ʔaTaR, QuaRRies, from which CoRes are CoLLeCTed and PRePaRed before being TRaNSPoRTed, just like animal carcasses.

Finally, the flint is ChiPPed following several STePs, in an iTeRative, exploratory PRoCeSS. For indeed, flint KNaPPing in the Palaeolithic era required more than simply following iNSTRuCTions: it also required the ability to react, to SeiZe an oPPoRTuNity, when the SToNe BRoKe in an unexpected way.

In fact, opportunism was essential in the Paleolithic age. Never WaSTe anything, « BaL taShḤyT » in Hebrew, is something the SChooLMaSTeRs, the MowRowt, TeaCh LiTTLe ChiLDren in Jewish schools. Turn anything into good account. Salvage everything. The same with cave art, where the paintings seem to perfectly match the natural relief of the caves.

Boom. All was clear in my mind: in the Paleolithic era, our ancestors viewed flint and its manufacture in the same semantic space as the carcass and the cutting of it. I was overwhelmed by such beauty. I even cried. I've wept a lot in the meantime, realizing just how much we've lost since the dawn of Neolithic.

And this revelation shed new light on the famous passage when Christ gives Simon Bar Yonah the name Peter, as recorded in the Gospel according to Matthew, chapter 16, verse 18:

« And I tell you, you are PeTeR, PéTRos, and on this RoCk, PéTRa, I will build my ChuRCh, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. »

This is a very important verse for gospel scholars, who study whether Christ spoke Greek or Aramaic - I'll come back to that in a moment.

Do you now understand what I've drawn here? No, it's not a merry-go-RouND. It's not a church or a TRiBunal either. Or maybe it is a 25,000 years old merry-go-round, church or tribunal, since it can be found in many caves throughout Spain and France. Paleoanthropologists call it a tectiform, which means « shaped like a RooF », but until today, no one has been able to to unlock its secret.

Well, « Truly, I say to you », this shape is also that of the TowRah - sorry « Ta Ra »- but this time with a different meaning than that of sharing: it's the shape of a BiFaCe, a HaND-aXe, RoTaTing around its aXiS of SyMMeTRy, with strokes expressing the chipping and small CuPuLes expressing the ReTouChing. And if it looks like a merry-go-round, a church or a tribunal, it is because it is symmetrical, because it has the RiGhT FoRM.

Now you also understand why in French the word « TouR » means both to TuRN, as well as the idea of CRaFt, SKiLL; the so-called « TouR de MaiN » (litterally « turn of HaND » – sometimes a « tour de force »), which can be found in the Latin ToRNare, to turn as well as to craft, and in TRoPos, which means to turn but also MaNNer, WaY, FaShioN, attitude.

In the Oldowayan, Acheulean, Mousterian, Chatelperronian, Aurignacian, Gravettian, Solutrean and Magdalenian manners.

What? You don’t know the Paleolithic LiThic iNDuSTRies? Quite simply, they're the different ways, manners, of FLiNT KNaPPing as this craft gradually evolved during the Paleolithic, enabling our ancestors to produce more and more yards of CuTTing eDGe with less and less MaTeRial. I'm not the person claiming this, but the great prehistory specialist André Leroi-Gourhan.

We find this idea of CuSToM or way, in Hebrew, with the word TowRah, which has basically two meanings. The first, known to everyone, is the meaning of teaching, education, to which I'll return in a few moments. But there's a second, probably more archaic, meaning: manner, way, custom; a meaning found in the 2nd book of Samuel, chapter 7, verse 19, or in Chronicles, chapter 17, verse 17, referring to « TowR haʔaDaM », the customs of men.

By the way, for those of you interested in biblical exegesis, these two almost identical passages from Samuel and Chronicles are not translated in the same way in the Jewish canon, whereas they are in the Septuagint. Just saying... Anyway, this connection between manner, form and cutting edge can also be found in the words « RiTus », RiTuaL, « RouTe », and « RoTa », all of which have a double meaning : RiGhT FoRM but also right manner.

This concept of Right Form is key: « Ta Ra » is the RiGhT FoRM, for FLiNT as well as for PaRTing, or we could say the TRue form. What are you saying? « True » comes from a Proto-Indo-European cognate « doru », found in the French « DRoiT » (meaning both LaW and RiGhT )? Are you a Pharisian to talk such rubbish? You see, my young fellows, the problem with Pharisians is that because they transform everything, nothing makes sense anymore. No ma'am, no sir, in most cases a « d » is a « d » and a « t » is a « t ».

As Christ used to say Matthew 5, 18:

« For TRuly I tell you, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest LeTTeR, not the least STRoKe of a pen, will by any means disappear from the LaW until everything is accomplished »

And as you can see, I follow his instructions to the letter: I never transform anything, I just apply a principle linguists have been ignoring for waaay too much time: the one called parsimony, of the famous Occam RaZoR (don’t get CuT like the Pharisians !).

And « True » comes from TRuCe, the TReaTy. And a treaty is respected when it's drawn up in the Right Form.

This double meaning of right form and right MaNNer is also found in the Latin DeXTeR, which means not only the right hand, but also SKiLL, DeXTeRity (« TouR de MaiN »), or even the right or favorable moment. Remember, flint KNaPPing requires both skill and the aBiLity to SeiZe oPPoRTuNities when a FRaGment doesn't come off as PLaNNed.

What? You've never KNaPPed a FLiNT in your life? What is school supposed to teach you? A good way for you to visually undersand what I'm talking about is to PeeL a PoTaTo right here. Watch the MoVement of my HaNDs, and how I ShaPe the potato as I go.

You know what's really funny? Remember the word CoRTeX we saw in my previous video, meaning the BaRK, the CRuST, that SuRRouNDs, KeTeR, which I related to the CuT FLeSh, KaReT? Well, paleoanthropologists themselves use this term to refer to what's left of the ouTeR eNVeLoPe of the CoRe, the bit of remaining CRuST that appears on some flints - the bit of potato SKiN.

Astonishing, don't you think? After tens of thousands of years, great-great-great... grandsons and granddaughters are using the same words as their ancestors to describe the same thing. CoRTeX. That's the strength of human language, its STRuCTuRe allows it to reach across generations. Except when you're a Pharisian linguist!

Back to the RiGhT FoRM. The PRoPeR form, therefore, is the BiFaCe form.

Like the dromedary's hump (remember KiTR, with its counterpart KeTeR the SuRRouNDing CRoWN): a beautiful biface has an aXiS of SyMMeTRy and RoTaTes aRouND it. Just like forming the FRoMaGe, the CheeSe - you know TyRos. Forming, FRoMaGe ... yes, you got it ! And also like the form of the TuRTLe, encountered during the preparation of a biface, at the STaGe called the « PRePaRed CoRe ». Lastly, like the form of the TaRSuS, from the Greek TaRSos, the bones in the foot looking like a FLiNT ChiPPed into PieCes.

This connection between form as shape, and right form can be found in the Book of Ezekiel, chapter 43 verses 11 and 12, which tells of « TowRat haBayiT », translated as the rule of the temple, but which actually refers to the ShaPe of the temple and the WaY it is BuiLt. It is also found in « TReND »: when used as a synonym of BeND, it indicates a CuRVature, what causes something to TuRN.

Now you understand what an « aTToRNey » is, PaRaKLètos in Greek. They are not the one you TuRN to, like I said in my introduction, but the one who aTTiRes, the one who aRRanGes, who eMBeLLishes. Old French had « aTouRNer », that was kept in the saying « être sous ses plus beaux aTouRs », to be be in one's most beautiful attire.

This brings us, at last, to aRT: the aRTist is the one who knows how to attire - be it SCuLPTure or PoeTRy, with TRoPes - figures of speech that TWiST (« DéTouRNer » in French) the meaning of words or expressions, from the Greek TRoPè.

And believe me, to attire is no PieCe of CaKe – « c’est pas de la TaRTe », for indeed, you need quite a « TouR de MaiN » (KNaCk, DeXTeRity) to MaKe a TaRT that can be CuT. And this meaning of the WoRK of art can obviously be found in the Enuma Elish with the word TeRiSha (6th tablet, verse 57).

The talent of the aRTist who knows how to aTTiRe FLiNT has always been spectacular, almost magical: hence the MaGiC TRiCk (« TouR de MaGie ») that requires some DeXTeRity (« TouR de MaiN »), and why the French « TRuC » means not only a Thing - which can be cut, as I said in my previous video - but also a TRiCk, from the Latin TRiCor, to TRiCk or get aRouND someone, and TRiCae, to ConFuSe.

In the Enuma Elish, too, we find this meaning of magic trick, in tablet IV verse 71 with uTaRi. And this is how we connect the TowRah to the famous TRiCkster and his SLeiGht of HaND (« Tour de PaSSe-PaSSe »), whom I love, as do the ShaMaNs and storytellers around the world. The trickster creates confusion but is also a TeaCher.