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…a yard containing shrubs trimmed in ornamental shapes.
“This,” I began, “is called…”
“We know what the name is,” they interrupted. “Why don’t you just tell us which way to go?”
“I wasn’t referring to the plants,” I said in a huff. I refused to say anything else, leaving them to find their own way to…
- Images and text copyright 1985 by Christopher Manson
used with permission. [Purchase MAZE from Amazon]
Room Type: LOOP Doors: 1 12 24 31 44
Solution Summary: [COLLECTION CURATED BY WHITE Raven. SEE COMMENTS FOR ADDITIONAL SOLUTION PROPOSALS.]
● The black snake and white snake next to Door 44 match the four dark shrub balls and four light shrub balls. 4&4=44, the correct door. [Independent Credit: vewatkin / Dave G | White Raven] The white snake looks toward the correct door while the black snake looks toward the door to The Abyss. Further, the lightly colored shrubs are in front of the correct door, while the dark ones are in front of the door to The Abyss. [Independent Credit: Dave G | White Raven] Alternately, the shrub balls could be taken as dots and the tree trunks as dashes, in Morse code four dots and a dash is the number 4, thus “….- ….-” reads as “44″. [Credit: vewatkin]
● At the base of door 44 are three steps leading upward. In the background are tapered trees pointing upward trimmed to have three tiers – suggesting we take the three steps upward in door 44. [Independent Credit: vewatkin | White Raven].
● The snake picture, wrench and bird convey the warning “turn around.” The snakes in the picture are depicted turning around. The wrench is turned around in order to use it. The bird has turned around to look at the reader. The bird could also seen as conveying the related message “turn back” since the bird is prominently showing its back. If the reader enters from a room other than 31 or 44 the message is a warning that they have taken a wrong turn. If the reader enters from either 31 or 44 the reader would be wise to head back the way they came to avoid the door to Room 24 – The Abyss. [Credit: White Raven] [Subsequent Credit: Aria | Factitious].
The spanner on the floor measures the “yard” (from the text). Its measuring the ‘span’ of the distance. A yard is 3 feet or a metre. Poetry/Odes/verse have feet and meter. The spanner has hex ends. It is a clue about “hexameter”. We need “dactylic hexameter”.
The twin snakes are Hermes’ staff Caduceus but missing the wand/staff and wings/feathers. I wrote in room 20 how it is about Homeric Hymn #4 (which is “dactylic hexameter”, like Iliad/Odyssey). In HH4 Hermes creates the first lyre from a tortoise and eventually gives it to Apollo who gives him Caduceus.
Now we need “dactylic” and the missing feathers for Caduceus. Well, the bird looks like a pterodactyl with feathers. As a prefix “ptero-” means “having wings”. So we move can move the ptero- off the bird for “dactyl” and for the wings/feathers of Caduceus.
For the missing wand/staff I’m not sure yet. The blind man in room 29 seems to hold it.
Room 40 has a “span” symbol directly below hermes’ winged foot/sandal symbol.
This symbolises measuring the feet of Hermes. Which is “dactylic hexameter” for Homeric hymn 4.
Homeric hymn 4 is also a massive part of room 20 and the turtle/tortoise.
The wrench shows two U shaped openings , each containing 4 flat sides . 44
This is incorrect. A wrench has 2 ends, with 4 flat sides, so the answer is 24.
Counting things can be twisted to mean anything you want. It’s not the way.
We’ve been discussing this suggestion in the MazeCast discord. I don’t think that the number of sides on the interior of the wrench heads is really a clue, but I do think there’s some value in musing out loud about this kind of thing. We’ve noted that there are a number of things in the room that demonstrate symmetry of a sort, which seems purposeful but for which we have no good explanation.
Because we’ve been seeing a lot of “count things in the room, find the number of the door you want” suggestions, though, I do want to emphasize that you will almost always be able to find ways to count small numbers in every room, and it generally just doesn’t seem plausible to assume you’re intended to find the one right way to count things to get a specific answer.
If there were 44 of something in the room, or 4 of something with 11 parts, something like that, it would seem a lot more intentional, for obvious reasons. But you can likely look around whatever room, vehicle, outdoor area, or space station you’re on right now, and find multiple ways to count to 4.
A terrible idea: out of all the rooms connecting directly to 1, this is the only one without ringing or something sound-related. (41 is full of horns and the girl has her fingers in her ears; 20 and 26 have ringing). When the guide says “this is called”, we assume they’re going to tell us the name of something- as the guests say, “we know what the name is”- but is this correct? Maybe “calling” is a reference to a phone ringing, or birdcalls, or someone making a sound. Like the girl in 41, they aren’t listening, and are on the wrong path completely.
Seems like a good thought! “This is called” meaning “this gets called.”
a bird’s song
a [phone] number
a name
uh….
roll
curtain
the toll-free 888 area code (this is assuredly the one)
Wait, the dangerous area of the loop resembles courtyards/gardens. So we were “led down the garden path.”
OK, so we’re in a YARD and there’s this BIRD, see… is it a YARDBIRD?
Because one of the meanings of yardbird is “convict” — and if you enter this room from 1, you have become a prisoner of the Loop — unlike any of the other rooms you enter from 1, which allow you to change your mind and TURN BACK.
Alternatively it just means you automatically become a wicked good guitar player.
Or a convict -> prison -> trap connection could just be a sort of general warning about 24, I guess.
As rock and roll related solutions for this room go, I like your Byrds “Turn, Turn, Turn” one better….
I KNEW you would appreciate that one, 515! :-D
Is there something meaningful going on with the semicircular planters on top of the columns? The ones over 44 seem relatively well trimmed. The planter to the right of 24, though, looks like it’s starting to get overgrown. It also looks a bit like it might be tipping over (into THE ABYSS????). The planters over 31 are completely overgrown. Perhaps the emphasis on “trimmed shrubs” in the text tells us to go for the better groomed, stable-looking planters.
It’s been pointed out already that “name” appears twice in the text: once in orNAMEntal and then in the guests’ somewhat oddly worded statement “we know what the name is.”
One possibility that has been discussed in the Hangout is that the emphasis on “name” is a supporting clue for Morse code, because it includes the name of the person who invented it.
It’s hard not to want to look for different names for the wrench or the bird. I’ve found a few interesting things about wrench types, and here they are.
1. That’s an open-ended wrench on the path. The shapes of the doorways kinda match the shapes of the ends of the wrench. And from this vantage point, the end (bottom) of the doorway to 24 is completely covered by the shrub, or closed. The bottom doorway to 31 is partly covered by the bird’s head, and partly by whatever that circular thing is. The bottom to 44, though, is mostly OPEN-ENDED by comparison.
2. There is a type of wrench called a crowfoot wrench. This type of wrench is just what you’d consider the end of a normal wrench. You attach it to a ratchet handle, which is oriented perpendicularly to the wrench. When the wrench and handle are attached, you get something that looks like the leg and talon of a bird, hence the name. Then we also have a bird with long legs. We can’t see its feet. Then we have the number 44, with the digits looking like two stylized crowfoot wrench pieces – the missing feet of the bird? It all seems to KIIIIND of work together. (It would be a lot nicer if that bird were a crow, of course…)
On another page vewatkin wrote,
“The Morse code for 4 is [....-]. In Room 21, we have the repeating pattern with the bushes shaped like four circles, and then the straight tree trunks extending off the page. Four dots and a dash, four dots and a dash.”
This excellent solution gives us a choice: Either 44 is indicated by the four shrub-balls separated by a tree with another tree off to the right OR 44 is indicated by four shrub-balls each followed by a tree representing a dash.
In favor of the posted solution is the fact that the four shrub-balls on the left are in the light and the four on the left are in the dark while the tree trunks are not shaded differently…also the trees are vertical and not very dash-like.
In favor of the Morse code solution is the fact that there is no tree to left, which would disrupt the pattern, and there is a tree to the right which is unnecessary for the posted solution.
I am posting the Morse code solution as an alternative to the previously posted solution.
Congratulations Vewatkin!
White Raven
Don’t tell anyone, WR, but I meant this solution for real! I can’t remember the last time that happened.
The trees pointing up in the background, the tall trees in the foreground, the high balcony, a bird… all of this stuff relating to high places could be a hint to pick the “highest” number, 44, which also handily comes with stairs as already noted.
I feel like this has been talked about a bunch but I don’t see it on the solutions list and it seems intended due to the last part of my point: The correct door here are two numbers that are the same (4 and 4) and is the only door with a double number. Likewise, there are twin shrubs, twin snakes (despite their different colour), twin trees, and most peculiar, the wrench with two hex slots that are the same size. It is near impossible to find a wrench of this type. There are three types of wrenches: adjustable, box, and open ended. Wrenches with open ends on both sides are different sizes on each end (12mm and 14mm for example, or 1/2 and 3/8). Manson has paid particular attention to make both sides the same. See image: http:// imgur.com /Mut2JkD
Those PAIRs of ornamental shrubs are kinda PEAR-shaped, aren’t they?
It’s not topiary, it’s toPAIRy.
Actually it’s TWO-PAIR-y.
That bird, a species known for its fondness for bland paint colours, had better get back to its TAUPE-EYRIE.
(SP, I’m sorry I’m junking up your post with this stuff. I can’t seem to stop.)
sp,
It’s a great point, but it makes more sense when a related puzzle is solved. Beelzebibble, Dave G and you are all on a list of people to be credited when the larger puzzle is solved.
White Raven
Don’t follow the bird to 31. It is leading you “up the garden path.”
(An expression meaning you are being deceived.)
If you look back at the whole page the trees and railing look like a really big 44.
I actually kind of feel like the trees themselves represent the two 4s in the correct door number… two trunks that spread into branches, just like the 4s (in highly simplified form).
The bird is similar — two legs branching into claws, just like 44 (upside down).