[A. G. Maisey]

Regarding round tangs and tangs with sides:- if you are going to forge round, you draw down to square first, so a tang with sides is faster to forge, however, the tang in a modern keris is not forged round, it is made round by stock removal.What I wrote on the tang of Buda style keris was only intended to apply to those implements. One may be able to extend reasoning into another dimension, but my comments were specific to the keris Buda alone.

The implement under discussion cannot be named with any certainty, nor can the suggestion of a possible name be discounted. The language we are dealing with is Old Javanese, which has not been in use since the 1600`s. In Old Javanese one of the words for an axe is "wedun(g)". This implement may be a wedun(g), or it may not be. Certainly it bears no similarity to the knife that we presently know as a wedung, but this modern knife is purely ceremonial in function, indicating the willingness of the wearer to cut a way through the jungle for his lord.However, it is not valid to discount a name, nor attempt to affix with any certainty a name, for any archaic object, basing that attempt upon present day names for present day objects.
Of course, for simplification of reference we can call this object anything we wish, but that does not mean that we are using the name by which it was called by the people who made and used it.However, in Old Javanese a kudhi was a knife with a curved blade used to cut grass and that had a bulge in the blade near to the handle; I do not think that this definition is suitable to describe the object under discussion.
I have some difficulty in understanding why we need to give this object a name at all. It is obvious that we cannot name it correctly.

Any bhuj that I have ever seen bears not the smallest resemblance to the object under discussion, in any case, there is little or no validity in comparison of a 19th century Indian object with a Javanese object from the far distant past.

I do not understand why we are attempting to link this archaic Javanese object with objects from other places. It is a tool, or perhaps a tool/weapon, its origin is Jawa, and Jawa did have an indigenous culture of its own, prior to contact with the Indian subcontinent, and subsequently with other parts of the world. The nature of Javanese society and culture is that it has continually absorbed and modified input from other cultures, so it may well be that this humble little iron implement did have a progenitor from some other culture, or it could be that it is something uniquely Javanese. To settle this question would require an immense amount of very dedicated and intense research, at the end of which, no answer may be able to be provided.In any case, this object is one of a class of objects. These objects bear similarities in construction and form, but all are different.

Based upon the objects of similar form that I have seen over the years, I am inclined to consider this type of object something that was fairly widely spread throughout Jawa for a considerable length of time. The Early Classical period in Jawa was to roughly 1000AD, after which there was a shift of power to East Jawa, we had a procession of kingdoms in East Jawa, culminating with Majapahit which was finished prior to 1525, the Islamic kingdoms followed Majapahit, and the move back to the interior came with Pajang, followed by the foundation of the House of Mataram, which is still with us today. From this, it can be seen that there is a continuity to Javanese culture that is not based simply upon the place where the ruler happens to be at any one time. In fact, the influence of the East Jawa kingdom of Majapahit extended into Central Jawa, and the Lord of Pengging, located near present day Kartasura, was in fact one of Majapahit`s most influential nobles.Candi Sukuh, which is only a short distance from Pengging, was built during the Majapahit era, and in an area that was under the control and influence of Majapahit. To draw a distinction between Sukuh`s Central Javanese location and an East Javanese center of power is a fallacious exercise.

I have seen objects similar to the one under discussion that were discovered in Central Jawa, I have also seen such objects that were discovered in East Jawa.

Why should it be necessary for these objects to have originated from some outside source?

Did the Javanese people not have a need for tools throughout history?

And would they not have developed tools suitable to their needs?


David, the figures shown at Sukuh with these type of implements are---as near as I can recall---not noblemen. The mention I made of noblemen was in relation to the figures depicted in the stele, one acting as smith, the other operating the bellows.

If we forget all about the fact that this is an archaic iron implement. Lets say we stumbled across it in a local hardware store. What use might we be able to put it to? I would suggest that the hooked blade would be perfect for lopping small branches from trees, as with a pruning hook, or the modern Javanese bendo, and the axe-like section of the blade would be perfect for chopping those branches into smaller pieces.The form of this implement would make it a very useful tool.