keris palembang

[sirek]

Thank you for the comment, I already understood that a keris from Palembang is not easy for me me to understand , as mentioned in an older post with a similar blade:

http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showth...ight=palembang

Originally Posted by A. G. Maisey

Palembang is in South Sumatra, it had and has long time political and cultural ties with the House of Mataram in Central Jawa, and was also influenced by Banten. Because of these associations the keris that come from Palembang very often have features that resemble either Banten keris, or Central Jawa keris.
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[A. G. Maisey]

Yes, Palembang is difficult.

The tangguh system that I use is the one I was was taught by Mpu Suparman. It addresses major tangguh classifications only. However, minor tangguh classifications can be accepted. The overriding requirement to give any blade as a tangguh classification is that it should be a style that can be regarded as representative of a geographic area or of a period of time, an era.

The problem with Palembang is that keris made in the area of Palembang were made in a number of styles that were copies of styles from other areas and other eras. For Palembang there is no hard-core dedicated style that we can associate only with Palembang. For this reason it is in my opinion impossible to have a "tangguh Palembang", but in recent years dealers in Jakarta, and I guess other places as well, have wanted to describe keris as "tangguh Palembang".

So this keris under discussion could resemble a Banten keris, or a keris from Central Jawa, but Banten keris seem to have a stylistic variation that might prevent classification as "tangguh", and keris from Central Jawa have several different tangguh classifications.

Any ideas about what might be appropriate for this particular keris?

[Jean]

The dapur of the blade looks Javanese but it may rather be from Palembang for the following reasons:
. The blade looks rather short, less than 35 cm?
. Pamor keleng
. Shape of the greneng, jenggot, twin lambe gajah, and gonjo (top view).
. The fitting of the blade into the scabbard is so neat that it looks original.
Regards

[kai]

Hello Jean,

You beat me to it! Seems we agree pretty much.

The dapur of the blade looks Javanese but it may rather be from Palembang for the following reasons:
. The blade looks rather short, less than 35 cm?
. Pamor keleng
. Shape of the greneng, jenggot, twin lambe gajah, and gonjo (top view).
. The fitting of the blade into the scabbard is so neat that it looks original.

Palembang blades of this style can be very small to really large.

Pamor keleng is also not unheard of with keris Jawa that focus on garap; thus, I'd prefer to leave pamor out of the equation.

Yup, most Palembang blades seem to approach gonjo of nyirah cecak style. (Except for those keris Palembang which are obviously Bugis-influenced or based on Sumatran styles, pretty much all prabot details seem to be borrowed from keris Jawa or keris Sunda.)

Yes, the crosspiece fit seems original; however, it could have been crafted for an imported blade, too.

Regards,
Kai

[kai]

Hello Alan,

Well, the square blumbangan points to the Mataram line (including extant offspring substyles). The ron dha are very crisp - most old blades will exhibit worn down and restored greneng.

From the excellent state of preservation, I'd guess that this blade entered a colonial collection right after manufacture; there even seem to be some working scratches left at the base.

I believe that this blade got crafted in Palembang following old Mataram style; if the ri padan were not sharp on the inside curve (difficult to establish from the posted pics - an angled view would help), this would support the notion.

Regards,
Kai