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Old 6th November 2014, 09:41 PM   #27
A. G. Maisey
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Join Date: May 2006
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Gustav, at this remove we do not know the name of this particular dhapur in Bali, and it is entirely possible that each of the kingdoms may have had different names.

I think you are aware of my hatred of the "name game".

In my opinion pursuit of the elements of the name game is tantamount to stamp collecting.

One can either become a student of the keris and study those things that are of some importance, or one can become a stamp collector and stick names on things, and then graduate to a file clerk, label the things and put them in pigeon holes.

I prefer to use my very limited time in pursuing knowledge of those things which I consider to be of some importance. This is not to say that we should all have the same priorities, different people are attracted to different pursuits, but the name game has almost no attraction for me.

The point I attempted to make in the post that you have so studiously dissected was that we are perhaps best advised not to try to draw conclusions based upon insufficient evidence, and in respect of Bali the available evidence for things related to keris is very lacking. I regret that I failed to make this point.

Regarding the terms used for the various characteristics (ricikan) of a keris. Even within Jawa there is a very wide variation in terminology. Some terms are more frequently used than others, and terms vary from place to place and even person to person. Seen through the distortion of time, these terms become subject to even wider variation. The various terms are not important, what is important in my opinion is the way in which the ricikan are seen, and how the terms are applied. The way in which the ricikan are understood is where the focus should be, not upon the variation in terms.

I am not aware that flat luk occur more frequently in one dhapur than in any other dhapur. If this is the case, I would suggest that it is so because more of any particular dhapur were made at the time when one of the general characteristics of the classification system (tangguh) was a flat luk. As is usual with the keris, this generalisation can become confused by the practice of making early patterns at later periods.

In general terms we can expect to see flattish luk forms in the older classifications of Javanese keris, once we move into the Surakarta period the luk form becomes more pronounced. In the Surakarta Pakem illustration of dhapur sempana the luk form is typical Surakarta, that is, quite deep. In Mataram S.A. the luk became somewhat deeper, but then during Kartosuro the form reverted to the previous flattish one.
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