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Originally Posted by A. G. Maisey
Understood David.
However, we would need to consider more than just when the Taming Sari story is first in hard copy.It would very probably have been a part of verbal tradition before it was ever recorded, and to nail that down would be more than a little difficult.
Legends, myths, folk stories, and most particularly the stories that a people tells to its children, are wonderful indicators of the values of a society, but I fear that they are not really of much use in historical inquiry. A social barometer if you will, rather than an historical one.
History itself is often open to question --- we all know all that "victors write the history books", which makes of history a set of beliefs agreed upon by most people, but a very great part of what we agree history to be can be proven to be fact. It is very often very difficult to find any fact at all in a folk tale.
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Well yes Alan, but i am not looking for any fact or historical accountability in the legend of Taming Sari. My question is not
if this story really happened, but when the people started telling the story with a magickal element to it. I am just trying to see if it is possible that the idea of the magickal properties of the keris started at an early time in it's development than the 19th century. It may not be possible to nail this down at all without written evidence as i would think it would be impossible to verify how a legend was told at any given time in an oral tradition. But if there is an early written copy that might give us some ideas.