Strange Sumatran/Moro keris? kris? dagger? with a Dutch blade?

[David]

Originally Posted by asomotif

By the way, this reminds me of a thread by Antonio Cejunior, where he introduced a contemperary Moro / Tanto hybrid knife.
Some forumites where pretty nasty on his creation.
In this case the maker of this odd Sumatra / Moro / VOC mix is not amongst us. That must be the reason of absent criticism. not ?

I actually see a great deal of difference between Antonio's hybrid knife and this piece. I don't feel that it was the makers intention here to create a hybrid mixing of cultural currents. He was merely making due, for what ever reason, with materials at hand to create a blade that is for all intensive purposes a traditional kris/keris. He may have used the VOC blade because it was taken from an enemy, because he lacked a good source of iron, because .... well, fill in the blank as you wish, we will never actually know. Even so, Dutch and Indonesian cultures where brought together, for better or for worse and it was inevitable that there would be some sharing of form and ideas. Take a look at the European motifs that were adopted by the Madurese in some of their hilt forms for just one example.
My complaint about Antonio's creation is that it brought together two entirely different cultural forms for no apparent reason. There was no historical logic to it for me. And for the record i don't believe that i or any of the other forumites who didn't care for this arbitrary hybrid expressed that in a "nasty" way. We just didn't care for it while a good number of others did seem to like it. We are all free to express such opinions here i believe. That the creator of Bill's kris is long dead has no issue for me. It seems to me to be a true expression of a historical mixing of cultures created in an acceptable (for me) traditional manner to serve as an authentic ethnographic weapon.

[Lew]

Bill

I have a keris in my collection that has weld in the center of the blade. There is a weld just to left of that blackened patch.The half to the left of the weld has no trace of pamor but to the right I can see a pattern. Will try and get a clearer pic to post. I remember a story about some of the Malay or Indonesian smiths that were forging keris and tombak from harder steel minus the pamor it made the steel tougher and was able to defeat the body armor that the Dutch were using at the time? Anyone here of this lore besides me?

Btw when I draw this keris from it's scabbard it produces a lovely ringing tone like a tuning fork .

Lew

[Rick]

The more I look at this piece the more I see a very strange Sumatran keris masquerading as a Moro piece .

If we removed the handle and blade stirrup what would we have ?

I'd love to know where this composite blade was forged .

Bill, do we have a blade length ?

[kai]

Hello Rick,

The more I look at this piece the more I see a very strange Sumatran keris masquerading as a Moro piece .

Nobody here suggested it to be a Moro piece (and I doubt the seller would care to distinguish between a Malay keris sundang and a Moro kris even if this were a full-sized blade!).

If we removed the handle and blade stirrup what would we have ?

The scabbard as well as the sorsoran could as well be from the Malay Peninsula AFAIK; the VOC blade does suggest a Sumatran origin though.

I'd love to know where this composite blade was forged .

Me too!

Bill, do we have a blade length ?

Overall length - 48 cm or 19"
Blade width - 2.4 cm or 7/8"
blade length - 35 cm or 13 3/4"
Thickness of blade at handle - 1.4 cm or 1/2"
Handle length - 11 cm or 4 3/8"
Width at ganga - 7 cm or 2 1/2"

Regards,
Kai

[Rick]

Hello Kai

This really strikes me as the anak alang* type of blade seen in Sumatra .
I'm not seeing much to suggest this is a peninsular blade .

Maybe I should move this thread to the warung .

Rick

*

[kai]

Hello Rick,

This really strikes me as the anak alang* type of blade seen in Sumatra .
I'm not seeing much to suggest this is a peninsular blade .

These are also found on the peninsula. There seem to be minor stylistic differences but I'm not positive that Bill's blade is specifically peninsulan.

BTW, nice blade, Rick!

Maybe I should move this thread to the warung .

I was never a fan of separating keris sundang from their cousins - seems like this piece makes an especially good case for moving all keris/kris threads to the Keris Warung Kopi...

Regards,
Kai

[VVV]

A difference between Rick's Sumatran blade and Bill's is the characteristic "C" close to the gandik.

Michael

[Bill M]

Ben, you are right about provenance, but if you want to further examine things, provenance can be easily faked. We have all seen fakes even in museums and sometimes those fakes have provenance.

I have seen fakes made from old pictures of artifacts and then the piece claimed to be the same one in the picture.

So the bottom line is to do the best you can and buy what you like at a price you feel is appropriate.