Hello Leif,
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I am fortunate enough to be headed to be taking a short trip to Sweden this May. While researching what to do with my time there, I stumbled upon a descriptions of a set of old Keris in the Stockholm Museum of Ethnography, and after some digging found pictures of two of them.
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Thanks for posting these!
It's really great that museums take efforts to make pieces in their care more widely available, especially online. I keep wondering about their project planning and quality control though...
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I'm wondering if any of the forum members have seen these in person
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Gustav or Michael would be our best bet, I guess.
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The museum's description follows:
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History of the Object
This particular keris belonged to the Swedish Queen, Hedvig Eleonora (1636-1715). The keris is mentioned in an inventory made by the Swedish Royal Armoury in 1696, which, in translation, describes “5 small “pungiorter” (the Swedish rendering of the poignards, French for dagger) with flame or wave-shaped blades, with accompanying sheaths of wood. One of these poignards has a hilt of ebony, one has an antler hilt and three have wooden hilts. All of them were graciously donated by Her Majesty the Queen Dowager”. The father of Queen Hedvig Eleonora, Duke Fredrik III of Holstein-Gottorp was well known for his library and “Kunstkammer” (Curiosity cabinet). In 1649 the famous and well-travelled mathematician, astronomer and ethnographer at the ducal court, Adam Olearius (1603-1671), became the librarian. It is not unlikely that the five “poignards”, i.e. kerises, come from this Curiosity Cabinet. They probably reached Holstein-Gottorp from Holland, from which place the first expedition to the East Indies was sent in 1595. The shaping of the keris’ hilt indicates that the dagger probably originated in Java. The ethnographic objects of the collections found in the Royal Armoury are long since deposited to the Museum of Ethnography
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1889.04.4175
I agree that this keris seems to originate from Java. It would be important to get better pics including close-ups though.
With a rather flat blade like this, any example remaining in Indonesia would nowadays be a "ghost" blade having lost pretty much all of it features.
1889.04.4173
This is a really interesting piece! On first sight, one might be inclined to see a keris Melayu in the blade. However, the greneng/jenggot as well as the gandik sure do look classic Java!
Regards,
Kai