[A. G. Maisey]

The colour caste in the blade is reflected light from a brick wall made of red and yellow bricks.

If I just photographed the bare blade I could remove the red and yellow saturation and you'd see the true colour, but I can't do that with the hilt attached or the hilt would appear without colour.

This was just a quick shot so you could see it. Around my place it doesn't matter where I take a pic there is a another colour comes in from somewhere. When I do a lot of photos at one time I can set up reflection boards and white sheets to block that light, but not for just a couple of quick shots.

There's another factor too with digital photos viewed on a screen, and that is the viewer's screen and its adjustment. In fact, on my screen I can barely see the red & yellow tints. My screen is recognised as a pretty good one for graphics, and I have it adjusted to around 70% brightness. If your screen is not correctly adjusted, or it is poor for graphics, you'll get an entirely different pic to what I can see.

The pamor motif is wiji timun = cucumber seeds. It is a surface manipulated mlumah pamor.

The meteoritic material used in this keris came from Arizona, I bought it as about a dozen quite small pieces, I welded these into a single lump and then washed it by folding and welding a further 7 or 8 times, then I passed it to the maker to use, what he received was a small, perfectly clean billet ready to use, just like a piece of commercial nickel.


Working with traditional hand tools I have made about 6 or 7 keris.

The first one I made before I was accepted for training by Empu Suparman, it was pretty basic, very small, and incorrect in many ways. I don't remember how long it took.

The next one I made under the guidance of Empu Suparman.

The forging was made with the assistance of a smith and a striker and it took two working days.

The carving was done with traditional hand tools and took me 16 days.

I welded the bakalan for the second keris in Solo and brought it home to Australia to carve. This keris took 3 days working with a smith and a striker, so 9 man-days in the forging. It is a pamor miring keris. It then took me 43 days to carve it. Most of that 43 days was time spent thinking and considering exactly how I should carve certain features, this consideration time was necessary because of my lack of experience.

All the other keris I have made were made in Australia and took around 3 or 4 days for the forging, working alone with no assistance, and never more than 15 days for the carving.

I emphasise this:- I have only ever used traditional methods and hand tools, in other words, the tools I have used are exactly the same as a pandai keris of 100 years and more past would have used.

6 months to make a keris?

A wrongko takes less than a week to carve, but you can buy a ready made wrongko of pasar quality, and it takes less than a day to fit a blade to it.

An ordinary pendok is available as a stock fitting, as is a jejeran and mendak.

In so far as the work itself. In Javanese thought it is not necessary for an empu or pandai keris to actually hold the hammer and chisels himself to claim authorship of a keris. It is perfectly acceptable for him to use the services of other people to produce the keris. This has applied with a very great number of very well known empus and pandai keris, including historic ones. The maker is considered to have used the people actually doing the hands-on work as tools.

Javanese people do not think in the same way that people from western cultures do.

Regarding tirakat. There are a number of ways to interpret this practice. It does not necessarily mean what you might think it does.

I know of a number of instances where a person from outside the World of the Keris has ordered a keris from a maker in Jogja or Solo, and when he received his keris it was in fact a keris that had been made in Sumenep Madura. Sometimes the Solo or Jogja maker might have refined it a little, sometimes not, and he certainly had it dressed locally, usually in the cheapest pasar quality dress available. The people who placed the orders seemed to be happy because they could not tell the difference between something made in Solo and Jogja, or something made somewhere else. I have accepted keris for redressing from several people who were very dissatisfied with the dress that was supplied with their ordered keris. Being an Indonesian is no protection when you venture into Central Jawa. I have also assisted Indonesians in the same way that I have assisted people who live outside Indonesia.

In one collection in Europe, that was put together by a very well known European keris authority who published books and who was widely respected, we can find a keris that he ordered in Solo and that he believed was made in Solo. This keris has been published. It was not made in Solo, it was made in Madura. This European gentleman has now passed away.

It is never, ever a wise practice to deal directly with a Javanese craftsman. The best way for anybody who is an outsider to proceed is to do things in the Javanese way, which is to deal through an agent.