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Old 25th July 2019, 05:08 AM   #6
A. G. Maisey
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Join Date: May 2006
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David, I have no knowledge of the Sundanese language, however, I have recently made the acquaintance of a gentleman from Sunda who was a university lecturer, he tells me that "duhung" ie, Amuk's "doehoeng" is in fact not a direct equivalent to the Javanese "duwung" or "dhuwung", but rather can only be used to refer to a keris that is in the possession of an important man, somebody with some sort of government rank, or who is recognised in his community as being of high status.

If that keris were to become the possession of somebody who was not a person of importance, then strictly speaking, it could no longer be referred to as "duhung".

Thus, all these keris that Amuk has shown to us must be keris that belong at this present time to a person of some status.
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