Some questions about Balinese hilt cup.

[A. G. Maisey]

Gustav, please see my post #12, this is what I wrote relevant to the kekandikan form:-

"Gustav, I do not know a Javanese wrongko form that has the same or similar form to a Balinese kekandikan.

This is not to say that such a Javanese wrongko form has never existed, it is to say that I do not know of it, & have never seen any Javanese wrongko that is able to be classified as "kekandikan" using Balinese standards.

The kekandikan in post #6 would be classified as kekandikan in Bali, & I cannot see anything in the complete keris dress to indicate a Javanese origin."

I have seen & handled truly thousands of wrongkos, I cannot recall having ever seen a single Javanese made wrongko that could be classified as kekandikan, using Balinese standards. Not one.

Of course, my memory could be at fault, but I honestly do not believe so --- true, these days I have to think really hard to remember what I had for lunch yesterday but I can recall things from 20, 30 70 years ago, & sometimes with golden clarity.

However, once again I would like to draw your attention to what I actually wrote. I have given my opinion that the two keris in question definitely & without question do qualify as the Balinese kekandikan form. But at no time have I questioned your own opinion of where they were collected.

How could I ever question this?

I was not there when they were collected, I was not there when you purchased them, & it is entirely possible that at the time of purchase you were given information by the seller that you choose to believe.

Where they came from before they appeared in Europe is not up for discussion, nor argument, I accept your opinion.

Given that there is no dispute about where these wrongkos were collected, there remains the question of where they were made. Since this form is associated with Balinese royalty & nobility, & since it is a formal style in Bali, it seems reasonable to assume that both these wrongkos were made in Bali.

It does seem to be highly unlikely that this style could have been worn by a Javanese man in Javanese society, but it could well have been worn by a Balinese man anywhere.

As I have commented, the keris in post #11 is a mix of parts or styles, I have not seen a Balinese keris with a gandar like the one on the post # 11 keris, but I have seen a similar gandar on a North Coast Jawa keris.

In olden times there were a lot of Balinese people working in Jawa. Bali was a major supplier of slaves, the women were highly prized as both wives & servants, the men were more robust than Javanese men & were prized for heavy labour & as guards. Moving up the social scale a bit from debt slaves, marriages between noble and royal families, and also between merchant families from Jawa and other places was not at all uncommon. Going back for more than 1000 years, Jawa & other places in SE Asia were not isolated from one another, people moved from one place to another, & they took their keris with them.

True, movement from one place to another was not as easy & not as fast as it is now, for this reason lower status people perhaps did not move more than a day's walk from where they were born, but people higher up the pecking order & people who were items of trade, did move or were moved.

In the Mangkunegaraan palace in Solo, there is an exhibition of keris that were worn by Balinese men employed as guards, the dress on these keris is a mix of Balinese style & Javanese style. I once owned a keris that had a Balinese bebondolan gambar & a Surakarta gandar & pendok, I had purchased this keris from a private seller in Solo, it had belonged to one of his ancestors who had been Balinese, but who had moved to Jawa Tengah some time before WWI.

The location where something has been collected is not any indication of where it originally came from, however, since the keris is both a societal icon & a personal identifier, that is to say it indicates the origin & status of the custodian and/or wearer, it can continue to function in a society other than its society of origin. The factor that indicates the origin of a keris, both the blade & the dress, is style, because it is the style that gives evidence of the place of production.

As for the photo in the book "The Javanese keris" the same reasoning as above applies equally to that keris, it may have been collected in Ngayogyakarta, but where was it made, & for whom? We do not know. All we know is where it was collected, & that is no indicator at all to its origin nor its previous ownership.

If this gambar style was indeed a Central Javanese style at, or prior to, the date of its collection, why is it that we do not regularly come across examples in Javanese markets? Thousands upon thousands of old Javanese wrongkos often broken beyond repair, in the garbage bins of market place sellers, but never have I seen an example of this kekandikan wrongko style in a garbage bin --- & yes, I used to regularly look in the throwaway stuff. Nor on a keris for that matter. Why is the style unknown to Javanese tukangs wrongko now?

These two kekandikans under discussion may have been collected in Jawa, I accept without question your opinion that they were, but this style is Balinese, & has a place in Balinese society, it has no place in Javanese society.