The unknown carver of the Paunis river mouth

General introduction

The so called 'unknown carver of the Paunis river mouth' (Tarrabaenian: scótor clammus óris Paunis) was one individual, who left a number of carvings of mostly laments in a very confined area at the nothern shores of the Paunis river's mouth. While nothing about the person is known with certainty, the stone carvings the person left are singular in appearance and show a characteristic style of versification as well as of carving. The person wrote laments in Proto-Duinis 'Éch, which means that the Duiniken leaving the area in around 500 of the Era of the Earth is a rought terminus ante quem for his or her lifetime.

Supposed identity of the unknown carver

The Tarrabaenian scholars, in their efforts to study the past and also the Duiniken for their advanced culture, have made several assumptions about the carver. It was probably a man, as writing was a skill more prevalent in Men in the Duiniken culture of that time. Also the art of stone carving, while normally practiced with different methods than those used in these carvings, was a means of issueing royal decrees or propagandistic inscriptions glorifying deeds of the present Duiniken king first and foremost, but sometimes also of very high ranking military personell or very exceptional individuals. This kind of work also was exclusively in the hands of Men.

The metre used is typical for a lament. These were mostly written by Men, but performed by both sexes. Laments, as the name suggests deal with some sort emotional burden. The content of the thirteen discovered laments is diverse, but they all bear a strong personal note. Maybe the carver was connected to the high aristocracy and was suffering under the collapse of his homeland under the pressure of the Messellat Mdûlûn and the Tarrabaenians. All the laments are complete, which is rare for this genre, but also not unexpected, considering they were carved in stone.

Works

The shortest of the laments deals with the loss of a child. As normal, Duiniken poetry is quite graphic and does not linger in metaphors or similes. The 'child' was a soldier, so it is about a son of the author. While women took up arms at the end of the conflict with the two enemy peoples, a different term than for male warriors would have been used, 'sraiglóhh'. Only later, after the escape to Nuat Duinis Talou, it became normal for women, to be trained in warfare. The carver tells us, that there was a fight against the peasants and his son fell victim to their crude weapons. This indicates that the Tarrabaenians were the culprits, considering the Duiniken let them mostly work on the fields, as loggers or in quarries.

Other laments tell of a life away from home, in the 'mild meadows', which must have been somewhere in the central plains of modern day Tarrabaenia. His longest work, a lament about how he misses his beloved sister, is 84 verses long, quite an extensive lament, given the carver had to work it into the stone under difficult conditions, as the old, efficient techniques were not available to him, but the carvings were made using alternative treatments of the base stones and the tools also must have been below average quality, as the carver was far off his home and not in contact with fellow Duiniken.