old style barung! Borneo?
 

Here my latest addition to my collection which I am very fond of.
I was looking for such old style barung for a long time. And suddenly two of them popped up, but I only got this one unfortunately!

Features:
The scabbard is very broad, but in very good condition.

The cacatua pommel is also made of a very nice wood. Unfortunately a part of the beak and the crest had been broken off a long time ago, cause the breaks have a lot of patina on it.

The sleeve is made of horn, something I have never seen on a barung (I think there are a few in the Leiden museum with a horn sleeve, but it is hard to see on the database images). The horn has a big crack, but happily still there.

The blade was very dirty. I decided just to clean it a little of the worst dirt and rust, and than give it a slight etch with vinegar.
During etching a hardened edge popped up and also some lamination on the blade.

Any input/suggestions of which region it could derive?

Maurice

Hi Maurice,

I have no clue from where it is but I like it very much. Also when the outer tips of the pommel are broken is it just beautiful.:) Is it possible to fix the sleeve again?

Regards,

Detlef

Hi Detlef,

Yes indeed beautifull. But when the outer tips were recent break offs, I wouldn't be interested in it (I can be a very strange collector considering some features I especially don't want on an item in my collection, and recent breakoffs are one of them). But happily these were old breaks...:cool:

The horn sleeve has a very old crack (which is normal on horn, as we can often see on Atjeh klewangs). The crack is over the whole length of the horn, and just connected with one fiberpiece of horn (see attached image).
I leave it just as it is. It gives character to the barung.

The horn sleeve was very firm attached around the handle when I got it, and there wasn't any tolerance. Despite my precautions of taping and protecting the handle/pommel during etching, the sleeve was getting loose and there is tolerance now after the etching. I guess it was glued once which now came loose because of the heat.:shrug:
But happily there are no gluerests I can see, and I am not wiggling a lot with the sleeve. I will put the barung away very soon to prevent the horn get damaged irreversible.

Maurice

This is a nice piece and I believe it is from Borneo. They sometimes used horn for their sleeves (punto). The wideness of the scabbard and style also indicate Borneo as far as I understand.

nice barung, maurice. congrats! the one in juynboll's catalogue (pic below) has a similar (broad) scabbard 'throat'. perhaps you can find out the details from the catalogue and share it to us? :)

when i went to museo oriental in valladolid in spain, they also have two of such barungs which scabbards are almost exactly the same as yours -- i.e., wide 'throat' (upper part of scabbard), and stylized butt end (bottom of scabbard). the museum's curators strike me as meticulous in their description of their items. thus perhaps your barung is filipino after all. but the two barungs have the traditional silver sleeve, by the way.

i'd really be interested in how juynboll described the barung below. thanks in advance!

HuH??? :confused:
While it wouldn't necessarily be a deal breaker for me in this case i would have to say the exact opposite, that is, what a shame that the tips are broken. I see no particular beauty in the brokenness itself. :shrug:
I do like this barong regardless though... :)

Sorry, this is maybe a missunderstanding David since english isn't my native language. I have meant that the barung is just beautiful although the tips of the pommel are broken! :o :) Hope this is a better description of my conclusion.

Thanks for clearing that up Sajen, you did have me wondering... :)

Thank you Lorenz!
When looking in the database of the Leiden museum you find several with that broad scabbards. I attached an image of an old photo exposition ca 1885, where also is depicted a barung with similar scabbard.

Unfortunately I don't have the Juynbolls myself, so I am not able to look it up right away. Maybe another forumite can share it with us?

There is one in the Leiden database with a clear punto made of partly horn and partly brass.

Maurice

Thanks, Maurice! Would you have a larger version of the photo?

I was able to dig up my copy of Juynboll (bought this from Arjan earlier). Please see attached excerpts. What would be the translation of this, please? Thanks in advance :)

It has a lovely shape and form. Reminds me of art-deco furniture! Very stylish :)

Thank you for posting the Juynboll part!
I will translate it this evening for you, cause I got to run now and have very limited time at the moment.

I did already find some time for the larger version as you asked...:)

Thank you Gene! It is rather simple, but very elegant because of its shape..

Juynboll versus Leiden database
 

I found the real barung which is depicted in the Juynboll that Lorenz posted.

I thought it would be nice to post them together next to eachother ......

OK Lorenz, here we go! I hope you didn't expect too much of it!

1183/135-136. As forward (barong3), the blade pointed oval, the edge chisel-shaped sharpened.
The grip of yellow (135) or brown (136) palmwood, upwards thicker, coated with silver, within many of circular grooves; the upper part in the shape of a triangular, stylized birdhead with peaked beak and long protrusion, at the bottom of the backside crenated; the uppersurface diamondshaped with a centre-rib.
Scabbard of two slabs of (glued) brown wood, at the upperpart broadened with two scalloped curls; no. 136 at the upperside surrounded with ratan strips and decorated with incised curls, and at the outside foreseen of a grooved cross-rib.S.

Thanks Maurice, for all the pics and info! It's truly much appreciated :)

The mention of a "chisel-shaped" edge for a barung is interesting. But I do have a shandigan barung that has swollen edge just on one side - thus it appears chisel-edged. I hope I can see that Leiden barung in person one of these days.

When I went to Spain last September, I was actually planning to go to Leiden, too. But I ran out of time -- that is, money :D So I'll do it next time, as circumstances will allow.

Thanks again for everything!

Well there is a good tip to get this stuff displayed in the living room ;) :D

Yes Willem, how absolutely true!!!!:)

Well Lorenz, it is not that you would find actually all this stuff in the expositions in the museum. Most of it is not accesible for public unfortunately.

Another Borneo barung shape
 

A friendcollector of mine, and unfortunately ex-member of this forum, has given me permission to post images of his Borneo barung in this thread.

It is really a great piece, and actually there is a similar barung in a museum, but I can't recall which museum it was.
This must be a very scarce type, because in my years of collecting, I only know about this one, and the one in the museum.

Maurice

I think such barung as this one (in my last post) hasn't been discussed in the forum yet (as far as I can see with the search function).....and not one comment at all after 4 days????

On rare occasion I have seen a piece like this and I also think this is from Borneo.

Thanks again, Maurice. If ever the Leiden trip pushes through, I'll write to the curator beforehand to ask for permission (hopefully, he/she will grant it).

On a related matter, I think there's a team from the Philippines' national museum who go that Leiden museum from time to time to catalogue the Phil. items (and have in fact published at least one book already). It's cool that your country has preserved those Philippine pieces for study by generations to come :)

This barung is indeed a great piece like nearly all pieces in this collection. ;)
Now I understand why you want to have a similar barung. :)

Thank you Jose,
Maybe somebody has one in his collection which he would like to share in this thread? I would like see more of these...



Let me know when it is going to happen. It would be great to meet you guys in the Leiden depot..... :)


Absolutely true! I was looking for a good old style barung for quite a while. I wanted one to stay in my collection. Now I only need a shield, and I would be satisfied.... (well......almost satisfied).....:D

Thanks and looking forward to that! Also, we will tell the curator that we will be traveling half way around the globe just to see what's in the depot ... maybe that 'drama' will work ;) :)

Found this Barung on eBay last month. Dimensions are probably close to the ex-members Barung. My blade is not as nice and I don't have a scabbard.
The dimensions are: blade length 10.75 in., widest part of blade 3.25 in., length of handle 7.75 in.

Maurice, what are the dimensions of your and the ex-members Barungs?

Hi Maurice,

I'm a little late to the game here, but the shape/proportions of your barong remind me of one I acquired in August that was one of four Moro blades acquired by a U.S. officer following action on Mindanao in 1900. It too had a horn sleeve/ferule, though I can't really compare its length as it is obscured by the chord wrapping:

http://img408.imageshack.us/img408/2742/all3d.jpg

Kino that is also a beauty!
I like the condition of the horn punto. Is there somewhere a crack in it?

The dimensions of mine are (barung I mean ofcourse :D ): overall length 23,20 inches, blade length 13,75 inches, widest part of the blade 2,95 inches, thickness of the blade near the handle 8mm.

I don't know the measurements of Ben's barung, but the one he has and the one you have are more the same in shape I guess when looking at the images...they look more compact as mine.

Maurice

Thanks for posting yours as comparison. It could be yakan? But I'm not that experienced in barungs to be sure about it and maybe others can tell you more about it. However the cacatua pommel is not clearly yakan style to me..??
Can you see somewhere a sign where a possibly "thickening" in the chord wrapping stops, to nose out the length of the horn sleeve?

Maurice