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Author
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Comment
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JackiM
Registered User
(4/4/02 4:33:28 pm)
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the numbers three and seven
Hi! I have paper on fairy tales due tomorrow, and while I have it all written I can't for the life of me remember the signifigance of the numbers three and seven. I've looked around online, but I haven't found anything. If anyone can help I would REALLY appreciate it! Reply here or IM me @ bwaybound86!
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Jess
Unregistered User
(4/4/02 4:47:55 pm)
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three and seven
Jackie,
There are long discussions regarding the significance of the number 3 - I think back in September/August and probably before. Check the archived topics.
Jess
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Laura
Registered User
(4/5/02 7:48:49 pm)
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difficult
That's a tough question, as there's no singular meaning to any one item in pretty much any tale. If you can tell us a little more about why you need to know, or what it is you're trying to prove, we might be able to discuss this better.
Laura S.
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Jess
Unregistered User
(4/6/02 11:44:02 am)
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Three and seven and 40?
My impression was that Jackie needed help right away. I had started to list everything I could think of with seven and three, from the seven league boots to the incidents of three siblings in so many stories. Clearly, these numbers pop-up for a variety of reasons, some of which we have discussed in-depth previously. Numerical significance seems to depend also in part on the culture in which the story derives, although, perhaps entirely since 7 appears frequently in both eastern and western folktales.
I was always curious about the use of the number 40 in biblical and middle eastern references. Any thoughts there as long as we are on numbers?
Jess
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Jess
Unregistered User
(4/6/02 11:45:48 am)
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oops
Should have read "not entirely". Sorry. I guess I will
never figure out the edit function here.)
Jess
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JaNell
Unregistered User
(4/6/02 7:13:38 pm)
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7
Or "the seventh son of the seventh son"...
"I tell you three times and what I tell you three times is true"
"One, two, three strikes, you're out"
Although I seem to remember reading something about the way human memory works, and mystical numbers.
I'll get back with you on that.
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Jess
Unregistered User
(4/6/02 8:34:06 pm)
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3 and 7
I believe that there is something about their mathematical relationships as prime numbers too, but then so are 2 and 5 and you don't see much about them.
Jess
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JaNell
Unregistered User
(4/7/02 7:48:31 am)
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loonie
Maybe because two and five are so normal...
Two legs, five fingers.
Three, though...
Two people get together and make a whole new third person.
Now's that's magic.
13, lunar calendar.
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Elizabeth
Unregistered User
(4/9/02 11:46:29 am)
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Three & Seven
The number three is important in catholic tradition because of the trinity and the number seven is important to the jewish tradition because it is considered to be a perfect number. God created the world in seven days, etc. Both of these traditions migrated to Europe with the spread of Christianity and were assemalated into the culture.
Hope this helps,
Liz
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Otherworld
Registered User
(4/15/02 6:21:24 pm)
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Three & Seven
Hello all
Many beliefe systems have a 3 faced/faceted dieity.
if you want proof of how important 3 is to all cultures then try this experament..
take a match box,on one end of the drawer write 1 2 3 4 and on the other write "Why 3?"
Show people the numbers and ask them to chooses ..
80% will pick 3. When they pick the number turn the box round and they will read "Why 3?"
I tried this on 17 people before someone picked a diffrent number from 3.
3 wishes. 3 sons. 3 daughters. Concertos have 3 movments. 3 contains a begining middle and end. birth life and death. Mother, Father, Child. new moon full moon old moon. 3 gifts of the 3 wise men etc.
My own thought are that 3 is >
1] where a pattern can first be seen
2] a decision can be made
but it must be more than this.
I shall look up more
look forward to further info from everyone
Ta
mart
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Judith
Berman
Registered User
(4/15/02 7:23:53 pm)
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Re: Three & Seven
Pattern numbers are pretty specific to culture and ethnoliterary tradition. Four is the main pattern number in many, many Native North American traditions (and often has ritual importance as well). So you get four brothers, four sisters, four days and nights, four arrows, four stages to a journey, three repetitions of an action before completion, and so on. Some Native traditions do use three and five, including ones right next door to those using four. A fair amount of print has been devoted to this subject, especially how pattern numbers work out in particular oral narratives; see Dell Hymes, 'IN VAIN I TRIED TO TELL YOU', and also look for his new book due out maybe next year (?). He has recently argued that in one Chinookan group, or in some narratives from this group (I hope I'm getting the details right), that one pattern number is linked to men and another to women.
Three is a number with deep, deep roots in Indoeuropean and Mediterranean traditions. But it's by no means universal. On a more or less related subject, I was thinking recently about the week as a unit of time. I know nothing about its history , but it suddenly occurred to me (one of those "duh!" moments) that of course seven days is one-quarter of the lunar cycle, the time from dark to half or half to full. For people who live on the ocean, and make their living from it, this is no small matter, since the tidal cycle follows the lunar one and half-moon daytime tides are pretty puny while dark and full moon tides are quite big. So the lunar cycle can certainly be viewed as 4-part, not 3; but also 7 days (also traditionally the number of the planets, right?) is a quite legitimate period of time as far as natural cycles go. Again, twelve as a pattern number also seems odd (and why are there 12 inches in a foot??), but, again, wouldn't it be legitimate to at least argue it comes from the 12 months of a year? (There are, sort of, 13 lunar cycles in a year, but as I recall some calendars used 12 months with the extra days as an intersitial period...) OK, enough.
Judith
Judith
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Terri
Registered User
(4/16/02 7:57:36 am)
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Re: Three & Seven
Fascinating information, Judith. Thank you!
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JaNell
Registered User
(4/17/02 1:37:13 pm)
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No, more, please
Yes, thank you. I'd like to hear more...
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Judith
Berman
Registered User
(4/18/02 6:42:14 am)
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Re: No, more, please
About pattern numbers??
A couple of other books where there are articles on pattern and pattern numbers in Native American oral narratives (along with much varied and interesting other material) are:
Brian Swann, ed., ON THE TRANSLATION OF NATIVE AMERICAN LITERATURES (Smithsonian Institutions Press, 1992)
Brian Swann, ed., COMING TO LIGHT: CONTEMPORARY TRANSLATIONS ON THE NATIVE LITERATURES OF NORTH AMERICA (Random House, 1994)
Brian Swann, ed., VOICES FROM FOUR DIRECTIONS [more contemporary translations of traditional literatures] (University of Nebraska Press, forthcoming).
The first of these volumes focuses somewhat more on translation issues; the other two are collections of stories, songs, poems, etc. in translation, with introductions to each selection. I'd recommend COMING TO LIGHT as the best available anthology (i.e. collection of materials from diverse cultures) of Native North American literature, in terms of its faithfulness to sources and original context. Disclaimer: I have an article or translation in each of these volumes.
Judith
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Richard
Parks
Registered User
(4/18/02 9:52:29 am)
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Re: No, more, please
For another example of the importance of 4 outside of Native American culture, you can look at Japan. There 4 is considered extremely bad luck, because 4 is SHI (ichi, ni, san, shi) and shi is also the word for death. The kanji would be different but the name sounds the same. When telling time, you'd substitute 'yon' for shi. When buying a tea set, a Japanese would never buy four cups together, it's always three or five. If you get a Japanese tea set with four cups, you know it was made for export.
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Gregor9
Registered User
(4/18/02 10:51:00 am)
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Shi
Richard,
This may explain why what is referred to in my (and Judith's) aikido training as "fourth control" is the single most excruciating of all the controls we study. No permanent damage (that is not the aikido way at all) but plenty of pain while the technique is being applied.
Greg
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Judith
Berman
Registered User
(4/19/02 5:38:42 am)
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Re: Shi
But Greg, we've only been doing it for a week. Wait until your 4th control nerve is so sensitized that your shirt sleeve will do the control on you.
Richard, that explains the use of *yon* as the ordinal number (yonkyu, yondan). (My Japanese is strictly limited to martial arts vocabulary.) Interesting -- I've heard of animal names being tabooed and euphemized (if that's a word), like "bear" in many northern cultures -- but not numbers.
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isthmus
nekoi
Registered User
(4/19/02 7:56:42 am)
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Re: Shi
Ah... so that explains 'yon'. Perhaps the 'shi' in shichi explains the need for 'nana'?
Incidently, 4 is a very unlucky number in Chinese culture for the same reason. If you change the intonation of four, the meaning becomes death. At least in Cantonese anyway.
3 on the other hand, is very lucky b/c it sounds like 'life'.
I think that this sort of relates to Western culture...
3 is about integration and cooperation, the summer before the fall.
4 is about totality, completion... and inherent w/i that would be the idea of finishing, and of death.
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