Ivory Tulip Kris
 

This just closed http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...MEWA%3AIT&rd=1 , any comments? My guess is that this is post 1960 and Maranao. Doubt kris like this were been made for Western sales, certainly not your souvenir grade. Seems simular pieces are available from time to time of the same quality and style.

Someone got a nice piece for a reasonable price .
I think the blade is older than the dress .

agree with bill.

what i do notice is, krises that are still in the philippines are easily recognizable. i realized most, if not all, are redressed. to me, it has a certain appearance. perfect example would be the ivory hilt, which tend to be yellowish, compared to the ivory hilt that is on the kris that was brought here by the american soldiers. case in point are the the one that just came off ebay, and battara's example. another tell tale sign is the similarity of the grip. a lot has those disk-like stuff, or okirred metal panels. as for the scabbards, the 'datu-class', kris has similar stylized boat style cross piece... these krises were the same, from ermita to davao...

now, with that said, say these kris were redressed and it did indeed had an old blade, would that still be as valuable as a piece that has a 90% or more original parts, but less impressive?

What I find interesting is that the ganya seems to be two separate pieces which indicates an older blade but the luks are pointed which to me says it's of more recent manufacture :confused:

Lew

Lew, I'm sure the guard is one piece and I agree that the "angles" of the luks show post 1960 work. I also think it's a nicely made hand forged blade. The file work on the top side is nothing to brag about, but I like the blade. If this is a 21C blade, I'm impressed. Anyone from the PI have a better date for the work?

Yeah , I was wondering about that too . If you look closely at the downward gangya line where it terminates in the greneng there's something a little fishy .
It could be a really well cut false gangya line .
It's also a little bit stubby at 19 1/2" blade length .

I'm with Bill here. I think this is almost certainly a newer blade with a false cut gangya. It looks like a well made blade though.
As for new replacement parts i have no problem as long as they are well done and not done to deceive. I have noticed a furry recently of ivory kakatu hilts that all have this perfectly even coffee colored patina that i am almost certain is dye. They are often put on old mediocre to poor blades with the intention of convincing some poor sap that they are buying a datu kris. That bothers me. But being mainly a collector of Indo keris i have become very accustom to replacement parts as it is part of the tradition. Still, even there you sometimes see upscale dress on poor blades meant to increase their saleability. I have often seen this on Bali keris that are dressed up in jewel encrusted gold hilts and pushed as royal blades.

Well the gangya fooled me. I really fell in love with this piece. The hilt was a little flashy for my taste, but the blade seemed nice. I too thought it was old blade with new dress, but the angle of the luks does look wrong. It's pretty nice work, whenever it was made.

Steve

What bothered me about this sword is the blade has a light coat of rust on it but no pitting. The baca-baca is pristine, one would think if the sword was taken apart, the blade would have been cleaned unless of course you wanted to add some age. I have to stay away from keris buying. http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...MEWA%3AIT&rd=1 ,just got this today. Looks like the hilt is ivory and the cup is bone. Trouble is they glued them together and stained them. The stain did not stick well to the bone. Doubt much I can do about either the stain or the glue?

A Bugis style dress and unfortunately missing the buntut . :(
Interesting though . :)

Unfortunately false ganga are nowadays becoming quite common. :(

Spunger, to which kris of mine are you refering? :confused:

Bill, that seems to be a nice keris blade. Considering the price I wouldn't complain... ;) Please post pics after cleaning/staining the blade!

Can you remove the blade?

Regards,
Kai

battara,

i was referring to your avatar and the kris that went for $1800.+ the shade of the ivory on these pieces are consistent to the ones that are found on madrid's museum:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...c/HPIM2045.jpg

im comparing it to the ones that i saw in the philippines, which tend to have a yellowish tint on the ivory...

You do bring up a good point, Sunjer. The differences in the yellowing to a dark orange are due in part to age and to a large extent to the amount of sulfer to which they are exposed. The presence of sulfer in the surrounding environment is the strongest coloring agent for elephant ivory.