Well Green, it is a different world now to the one I learnt in, and the men who taught me learnt in a different world again.
In my experience the collectors and keris authorities of today have very different standards to ones that I was taught were correct and respectful. The study and understanding of the keris at the present time bears only a passing similarity to what it was in Central Jawa 50 or 60 years ago.
But still, you are right about this:- whether or not one observes the common courtesies of a time now past is totally up to the person concerned, there is more than one way to understand the keris, and the understandings of yesterday do indeed bear very little resemblance to the the understandings of today. The path one wishes to follow is entirely one's own choice.
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