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Originally Posted by Harley
I fully agree that the history is important, but what about the Bali keris that I've shown, the sheath i think was made for that blade,
OK the pendok was a bad repair, but it had a sort of history behind it.
It was a plain ugly sheath, but the woodwork was not bad at all, I've i had shared your opinion, then that wasn't a good choice either.
I can't tell you if this Javanese blade and sheath has a history, or it's just done to sell, it comes from a antique shop, so it could be both way's.
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If i recall that Bali keris correctly that sheath appeared to be a bit of a mishmash of styles that probably was indeed thrown together to make the keris salable. The woodwork wasn't particularly good, but also didn't appear to be a very good example of any true Balinese style of dress. At best it was rough village work that didn't really adhere to the standards of the form it was attempting to emulate.
OTOH, this Celebes sheath appears to be fairly nicely crafted of some very nice wood. The fit looks custom to me and my personal assumption would be that this keris was in "service" as a Celebes keris. A keris found in a particular dress like this can fairly and rightfully be referred to as being a keris of that particular culture regardless of the origin of the blade. Again, this is fairly common practice. As was mentioned in a recent thread, the legendary keris Taming Sari was said to have been made in Jawa, but is now considered part of the royal regalia of the Sultan of Perak, Malaysia. It is dressed as a Malay keris and considered a Malay keris.
Your are obviously quite good at woodworking and i would hate to deprive you of the pleasure of creating a new sheath for this blade if that is your choice and desire. I certainly wish i had your skill set as i have a couple of underdressed Bali keris that i would love to create sheaths for, especially if i could produce a traditional looking Bali gayaman as accurately as you seem to be able to do. But if this "Celebes" keris were mine i would consider it a Celebes keris (though recognizing that it's blade does come from Jawa) and be done with it.
