Gustav's Discovery

[A. G. Maisey]

I know I dubbed the feature I have in mind "Gustav's Discovery", or "element" or "whatever", and I did that for ease of identification. If anybody wishes to call this specific feature something else, it is not any sort of a problem to me.

However, if we look closely at "Gustav's Element" (for want of a better name) what we find is that there is not just one single element to consider. I think Gustav called it a "tri-partite" element at one point, but that "tri-partite" element has a number of forms that may or may not be related.

The form shown in Post #26, is, I believe, the oldest example shown (gold kinatah), and is a distinct example that shows detail and style that I believe is the most pure of the examples shown, "pure" in the sense that an attempt seems to have been made to represent in iron a form that might be able to be identified elsewhere:- note the tiny spike from the root of the central curved spike, something like this cannot be accidental, it must be able to be interpreted, a matching form in another medium must exist.

However, if we look at the other examples it seems to me that we could be looking at a different representation of something, in the other couple of examples shown in this original thread, and in other examples that I have seen, the same distinct statement that we can see in the Post #26 example does not exist. By a very large stretch of imagination it might exist, or it might be a distillation, or a corruption, or something else entirely.

For example, look at the "tri-partite element" in Post #31. This is a Bali keris. Anybody who has done even the smallest amount of reading on Balinese culture and society will be aware of the importance of the number 3 in Bali. To quote Murni & Copeland :- "everything comes in threes in Bali".

The "tri-partite" element in a Bali keris is open to any number of possible interpretations. As Dr. David suggested:-

"This is just a thought, and allowing that nothing is cast in stone when 'reading' a keris, is it possible that the feature identified in Gustav's examples is a representation of Siwa's trisula and hence a continuation of the Shivatic notation."

This idea is totally defensible and fits perfectly, for the form shown in this Bali keris. The keris itself is an icon of Siwa, why not put another icon of Siwa into the enhancements on a keris? It is a good idea, but it needs some sort of confirmation, and speaking only for myself, I have not encountered that confirmation, even though I could mount a very good logical argument to support the "good idea".

But does this element in the Bali keris look like the element in the keris with kinatah? To my eye it does not. There are any number of three part elements in a keris, but the original as shown in Post #26 is quite unique and distinct.

This form in Post #26 is the form that needs to be addressed:- solve this riddle and then it is possible to look at later variations of the "tri-partite" form and consider if we are looking at a derivation of the original, a corruption of the original, or something else entirely.

We need to identify the form of the tripartite element shown on the keris with gold kinatah.

Then we have a beginning.

Everything else comes later.

[Gavin Nugent]

I've taken a snippets from 4 keris and a Sundang...is this helpful and on point?

Gavin

[kai]

Hello Gavin,

I've taken a snippets from 4 keris and a Sundang...is this helpful and on point?

Well, all seem to be nice blades and deserve to be posted in dedicated threads, especially the keris Jawa and the Malay Sundang (or Sulu kalis?) IMHO.

All your examples exhibit a ron dha nunut; despite the differences in wear, it would be good to also include the whole gonjo since the carvings are often better preserved here than on the (usually thinner) blade.

In Gustav's motif/element, there is no classic ron dha nunut: the central opening in the form of the letter/syllable "dha" is missing and the "spikes"/parts/elements building the free space in-between are also of a different form. This motif is repeated on the gonjo (the best example has a replaced gonjo though) and also visible on the jenggot side (above/on the sekar kajang). I don't see this with any of your examples.

Regards,
Kai

[rasdan]

Hi Gavin,

Below is a comparison between a Malay greneng and the Javanese greneng in question. I think the Malay greneng below is a variation from the Javanese where the Dha on the Malay keris is at the normal position and the "bump" dha is probably a copy of the probably older Javanese style.

The difference is that on the Javanese examples (which is probably older), there is no Dha at the normal position, just a gap - which makes me think that the dha was shifted to the upper position on a third element that the "bump" dha style. Plus on the Javanese examples there is a gap between the ganja and the blade that resembles the gap on Megantara greneng.

The ri pandan style in your #3 and #4 in my opinion is newer development as many keris with this greneng style uses newer homogeneous steel that has no grains (probably late 1800's to early 1900's) rather than the older grainy wrought iron. (This is in the case where the keris does not use pamor - your #4 looks like it uses pamor). But this is just my amateur observation, I cannot demonstrate what I write here even as a hypothesis let alone a theory that can be proven.

[Gavin Nugent]

Thanks guys. "I feel like the child who has not yet learnt anything" like Alan mentioned in the thread leading to this point.

Gavin