[kai]

Hello Ron,

Thanks for posting your find! A lot of really good questions - not too many answers, I'm afraid...

it has a miniaturized ivory pommel that look similar to VVV's miniature kris (http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showthread.php?t=5834). odd thing about this is, the left side of the pommel has a complete appendage, whereas the right side looks like it cracked while it was shaped and instead of fixing it, it was stuffed with thin ivory pieces to cover the boo-boo. size-wise, the blade is only 16.5" long and an inch wide, an inch longer that VVV's, but i think these two came from the same era. the scabbard is in bisayan fashion, which was a latter addition. the scabbard itself is old, based on the hanger attached to the throat. the bottom shell wrap is missing. another odd feature is the surface of the blade. it looks like lamination, but then again it might just be imperfection on the the metal that was used.

Have you etched it already? I'm sure you can get more out of it, if you try!

I'm not sure that yours and Michael's kalis are from the same period. From the looks I think yours may be a later example.

I'm inserting a quote from almost 5 years ago which still seems a valid question.

Originally Posted by kai

Yes, I agree that our current working hypotheses need to be very critically examined, especially due to the scarcity of dated examples.

Most archaic Moro kris with obvious age (from wear, provenance, etc.) have a minute kink (at roughly 45 deg.) like Rick's left piece above or those upper 2 shown by Cato in Fig. 44. Also Alan's piece does seem to have had such a hardly noticeable protrusion. I've seen blades which have a perfect minute curve and a rectangular protrusion instead, respectively.

Then there are examples with a larger protrusion like the lower piece in Cato's Fig. 44 or even larger protrusions (like in Michael's piece). Especially the latter are pretty much in line what we'd consider to be 19th century pieces from later Moro kris style blades.

Since this "archaic kris" style seems to have been into production till the early 20th century at least (the latter examples seem to show similar lower skills as in other Moro kris blades), my main question would be which criteria can be used to tell wether any given "archaic" blade is really old, intermediate, even more recent (like 1895-1930)... I realize that Mabagani and others have reasons to believe that Cato underestimated the age - this would just shift the dating (not affecting the discussion wether we can estimate from the features of a blade to which age-class it belongs).

Are there examples with a more 19th c. gangya which show wear and/or greneng consistent with the oldest pieces?

Any "straight" gangya pieces with elaborate greneng similar to Michael's piece above? (Rick's left blade exhibits about the maximum greneng I've seen, I guess.)

Regards,
Kai

while we're on this topic, here's what i don't understand: why is it that the elephant's truck/eagle beak on these so called archaics are similar that if we have to go by cato's book, they are all sulu? if these are indeed the percursor of the longer krises, then is it safe to say all krises were made in Sulu and some were imported to mindanao (highly unlikely), or were all the krises had similar elephant's trunk/eagle beak design? if that's the case, when did the Mindanaoans deviated to have their own design? or are these so-called archaic krises are just another type of the myriad designs the Moros of yore had in their arsenal?

I seem to remember a few archaic kris that were from Mindanao rather than from Sulu (judging from the "face" design). I'll hit my archives after the holidays.

I believe that the preponderance of the Sulu type is most likely due to:
1. this design being most popular during the early period (possibly utilized throughout the region rather than limited to Sulu);
2. this type of kris continuing to be more commonly crafted throughout the Sulu sphere of influence vs. getting obsolete or out-of-vogue on Mindanao (at least until a possible later revival period).


Moreover, it seems worth to note that the "face" designs typically found with kris from Mindanao are neither Maranao nor Maguindanao inventions. All can be traced back to designs already in use with Sulu kris that only got modified (mainly by merely reducing the angle) to create the looks typical for Mindanao kris!

Regards,
Kai