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Originally Posted by A. G. Maisey
The dress appears to be genuine timoho and it is excellent.
The blade probably dates from the second half of the 19th century and is more likely to be from Lombok than Bali, Bali is not out of the question, its just that manipulated pamors seem to occur more frequently in keris that are certainly Lombok. It is not an unusual pamor. The garap is very good.
The carving on the gandhik is very non-typical, in my opinion it is much later than the blade and has probably been added to the blade to enhance sale value.
In its original form it would have been a good, upper-middle quality keris which in Bali/Lombok at that point in time would have served as both weapon and for social necessity.
This is the type of Balinese keris that seems to have left Bali in the period between about 1920 and 1960, we must of course exclude the the period of the Japanese occupation, but it does qualify as the type of keris that visitors to Bali brought home with them during both the pre-WWII tourist period and the tourist period through to about 1960, or perhaps a little later. Even in the early 1970's old keris were being reworked in Bali to make them more attractive to visitors. In 1982 I bought an old keris with a re-worked gandhik in a photo-processing shop in Bali, it was the last reasonably priced keris I was ever able to buy in Bali.
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It was said to have been a part of a collection that was very old. I guess this brings up the question of "authentic", i.e., at what point in a keris' life do changes become forgeries? Was there ever a type of decoration like this in that region? All the other figures I have seen seem to be more flat, almost like outlines.
As far as the pamor goes, I like it. I suppose if you have seen hundreds or thousands of keris, it may be no big deal, but I can certainly get lost in the pattern myself.