Ethnographic Arms & Armour - View Single Post

A. G. Maisey · 23rd April 2017, 01:12 PM

Johan, the reason nobody has made comment might be because nobody has anything useful to say.

I have made wrongkos, both gambar (top part) and gandar (long bottom part). I did this 50 or so years ago, my products were near enough to the real thing, and probably could not be picked from a job that had been done by a Javanese or Malay maker. However, I always had genuine wrongkos to copy, and I have had wood carving skills from a very young age. For a long time I made rifle stocks, both for myself, and to order.

Tools are not really any sort of problem, conventional chisels, small sharp knives, various scrapers --- usually purpose made from thin steel cut to shape --- sand paper, You cannot make a gandar without a joint unless you have the specialist tool for this, called a segrek, and there is another specialist tool that is like a curved arrow-head sharpened on the edges that is used inside the mouth of the gambar. However, for the 'arrow head' tool you can improvise with chisels, and for the gandar you simply make it in two halves and glue together.

I personally don't like the lamination idea. To my mind it is an insult to the keris itself ( the keris is really only the blade, all dress can be regarded in much the same way as a man's clothes), non-traditional and garish. I do understand your reasoning for using laminated material, but again, from my perspective this line of reasoning is totally irrelevant. If your finished product is good it will enhance the keris, if it is not good it will be replaced at some time in the future. Whether it was made in South Africa or in Jawa or wherever doesn't really matter. My opinion only, and may not be the opinion of some other western based collectors.

You need to make the wrongko so that the pesi is centered above the middle of the gandar. That is ideal, but even wrongkos made in country of origin frequently do not achieve this.

I do not understand what you mean by "engrave the wrongko".

The sides of the Bugis wrongkos that I have seen usually have a very gentle concave surface from the vertical groove towards the back, the surface of the wrongko in front of the groove is curved to blend into the rounded front. The groove itself seems to echo the position of the line of the back of the gandar on a lot of wrongkos.

I'm not particularly interested in Bugis keris, and there are a lot of people who are more familiar than I am with the details of Bugis keris dress, but what I can say is this:- I have a number of Bugis keris and the buntuts all vary a bit. I doubt very much that there is a universal standard for the buntut on a Bugis wrongko,if you have an example, copy it. The problem I used to find with buntuts was getting a neat joint, a butt joint is useless, you need to make a tongue on the end of the gandar and inlet it into the buntut, bit like a mortice & tenon joint but ovoid.

But if you have a usable gandar why not use it? I would.

The better Bugis wrongkos normally use a middling hard wood with strong chatoyancy. You probably will not be able to get anything like this, and for a beginning carver, soft wood is a lot easier to handle than hard wood. Most mahoganies carve well, stay with what you have already started.

23rd April 2017, 01:12 PM	#3
A. G. Maisey Member Join Date: May 2006 Posts: 6,736	Johan, the reason nobody has made comment might be because nobody has anything useful to say. I have made wrongkos, both gambar (top part) and gandar (long bottom part). I did this 50 or so years ago, my products were near enough to the real thing, and probably could not be picked from a job that had been done by a Javanese or Malay maker. However, I always had genuine wrongkos to copy, and I have had wood carving skills from a very young age. For a long time I made rifle stocks, both for myself, and to order. Tools are not really any sort of problem, conventional chisels, small sharp knives, various scrapers --- usually purpose made from thin steel cut to shape --- sand paper, You cannot make a gandar without a joint unless you have the specialist tool for this, called a segrek, and there is another specialist tool that is like a curved arrow-head sharpened on the edges that is used inside the mouth of the gambar. However, for the 'arrow head' tool you can improvise with chisels, and for the gandar you simply make it in two halves and glue together. I personally don't like the lamination idea. To my mind it is an insult to the keris itself ( the keris is really only the blade, all dress can be regarded in much the same way as a man's clothes), non-traditional and garish. I do understand your reasoning for using laminated material, but again, from my perspective this line of reasoning is totally irrelevant. If your finished product is good it will enhance the keris, if it is not good it will be replaced at some time in the future. Whether it was made in South Africa or in Jawa or wherever doesn't really matter. My opinion only, and may not be the opinion of some other western based collectors. You need to make the wrongko so that the pesi is centered above the middle of the gandar. That is ideal, but even wrongkos made in country of origin frequently do not achieve this. I do not understand what you mean by "engrave the wrongko". The sides of the Bugis wrongkos that I have seen usually have a very gentle concave surface from the vertical groove towards the back, the surface of the wrongko in front of the groove is curved to blend into the rounded front. The groove itself seems to echo the position of the line of the back of the gandar on a lot of wrongkos. I'm not particularly interested in Bugis keris, and there are a lot of people who are more familiar than I am with the details of Bugis keris dress, but what I can say is this:- I have a number of Bugis keris and the buntuts all vary a bit. I doubt very much that there is a universal standard for the buntut on a Bugis wrongko,if you have an example, copy it. The problem I used to find with buntuts was getting a neat joint, a butt joint is useless, you need to make a tongue on the end of the gandar and inlet it into the buntut, bit like a mortice & tenon joint but ovoid. But if you have a usable gandar why not use it? I would. The better Bugis wrongkos normally use a middling hard wood with strong chatoyancy. You probably will not be able to get anything like this, and for a beginning carver, soft wood is a lot easier to handle than hard wood. Most mahoganies carve well, stay with what you have already started.