Mandau with some unusual motifs

[VVV]

Yes Maurice, I remember that mandau. I have also had a mandau with chinese plates like yours
(but not as nice). Chinese beads and urns are very popular too among dayaks, all over the island.

David, the rings don't continue on the other side/half of the scabbard.
As a rule the back side is always unadorned on mandau scabbards.
On the Moro rings I have another kris with rings like that and it has 8 of them.
The reason I was curious on it was because the dayaks of Sarawak/Sabah
had a lot of contacts with Moros so that's maybe why it could have had the same source.

Michael

[asomotif]

Hello Michael,

I have never seen interlocking rings like these on a scabbard either.
Circles can also depict a snakes biting its own tail. or 2 snakes biting each others tail. The snake being a form of naga/aso like creature.

Best regards,
Willem

[David]

Originally Posted by asomotif

Circles can also depict a snakes biting its own tail. or 2 snakes biting each others tail. The snake being a form of naga/aso like creature.

The ouroboros (snake biting it's own tail) is a symbol that can be found in ancient Greece and Egypt and a concept that has been described (though i have never seen it depicted) in ancient India. It was picked up and used to a great extent as a European alchemical symbol. I do not believe i have ever seen it used in any Asian or SEA symbolism.
MIchael, i still think that the number of rings would be significant to the meaning of the symbol, so it is possible that the 6-ringed symbol on your one kris has a different talismanic purpose than your 8-ringed example.
There may well be a connection between the circles used on these Moro weapons and the ones on this sheath, but we can only speculate, especially with a symbol such as a circle which is so pervasive throughout all cultures.

[Maurice]

Michael,

I once had one with circles at the front of the scabbardmouth, I suddenly remembered.

The circles are not that beautifull carved as yours, but they are plain circles next to eachother......

http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showthread.php?t=7978


Maurice

[VVV]

Thanks all for your additional comments.
I haven't either seen the snake biting it's own tail in Borneo or Malay symbolism.
On the amount of circles I first suspected that the circle motif was a more potent (= complex or hidden if you follow the principles of seals and magic theories) variation of the seal of Solomon as seen above the rings in my example. My other Moro kris has 8 rings which corresponds to the 8 rings in the seal. The problem is that my "new" kris (the one on the picture enclosed above) only has 6.
Maurice, with your ex-mandau we now have 2 of those. based on the 100's of mandau we have in our networks collections as well as the museum databases that still is quite rare. BUT a collector friend of mine (A) told me that maybe it comes from other utensils like the enclosed example from Hose & McDougall Vol 1, p. 229? Unfortunately there is no explanation to it and in the other books of Borneo motifs, like A.R. Hein, I don't find it.

Michael

[David]

Originally Posted by VVV

On the amount of circles I first suspected that the circle motif was a more potent (= complex or hidden if you follow the principles of seals and magic theories) variation of the seal of Solomon as seen above the rings in my example.

Michael, where do you see the Seal of Solomon in this?

[Maurice]

Originally Posted by VVV

My other Moro kris has 8 rings which corresponds to the 8 rings in the seal. The problem is that my "new" kris (the one on the picture enclosed above) only has 6.

Maurice, with your ex-mandau we now have 2 of those. based on the 100's of mandau we have in our networks collections as well as the museum databases that still is quite rare. BUT a collector friend of mine (A) told me that maybe it comes from other utensils like the enclosed example from Hose & McDougall Vol 1, p. 229?

Hi Michael,

I don't know about anything about the rings on morokris blades, but in the Borneo part of Juynboll there's a sulu kris with 7 rings in the blade.... (so now we have 6, 7 and 8 rings in appearance.)

Indeed, very rare. Though I think you're rings on the scabbardmouth looks exactly like the motif from Hose & McDougall. Absolutely stunning!
I feel allready sorry for myself I traded mine at that time, though the rings were not that attractively carved as the one that you showed here. :-(

Maurice

[Jim McDougall]

Hi Michael,
Definitely has been slow around here, so thank you for posting this fascinating topic to stir some activity. While these weapons are far from my field of study, I am very much intrigued by symbolism. As David has well noted, it is extremely difficult to presume meanings of similar, if not identical, geometric shapes seeming to be symbolic in various contexts and cultures. We can only speculate unless specifically documented instances are found, which gratefully sometimes they are.

In the case of the markings on the Moro keris (post #7) I have seen the interesting square with looped corners before, in fact it seems recently while researching Mamluk material. If memory serves I have seen similar among groupings of 'magical' markings, mostly along with Kabbalistic devices and symbols found on talismanic blades (typically 17th-18th c.). Along with the concept mentioned by David, the 'Ouroboros' or snake eating own tail, this is a symbol of rebirth, and the earliest example known was Cleopatra's. It was as noted, entered into the alchemic lexicon, and many of these symbols and allegories became considered talismanic in varying degree. Alchemy and Kabbalistic symbolism became somewhat amalgamated in European culture, especially in Spain with its diverse religious cultures,particularly that of Islam.

This looped square may have some association with the 'eternal knot' which occurs in the art and symbolism of many cultural spheres, including in medeival Spain, Mamluk items and in India on items such as mourning rings and others.

It would seem most of the collective symbolism on this mandau is most likely to pertain to talismanic devices and probably using symbolism from Chinese and Islamic sources. The linked circles probably pertain to numeric qualification, as these are very much observed in tribal cultures of Asia as I have understood. I thought maybe there might be some celestial link as often observed in India and Africa to lunar phases, but these links seem more to represent number or simply linear motif than varying phases.

Im afraid these thoughts dont add much in explanation, but I add them here just for discussion and other observations.

All the best,
Jim

[VVV]

Thanks Maurice,
So probably the rings aren't connected to a fixed number.

David, I don't have my reference books around me now but somewhere I read that the double square star is a variation within the family of supposed seals of Solomon (the other ones are the pentacle and the hexagram, aka Star or Shield of David). As you probably know, no one really knows what the mythic seal of Solomon really looked like.
Cato calls it the ring of Solomon but I haven't seen that anywhere else.
Anyway it's not to be mixed up with the chaos star, which is also an eight-pointed star that is sometimes used as a "pentacle" in "modern ritual magic".

Michael

[asomotif]

two dragons / from : Hornbill and Dragon.