should I or shouldn't I change and repair

[kai]

Hello Nik,

Thanks for the additional info!

The fit is barely acceptable and the sheath is not the original to the blade I believe as shown in the pic below.

D'accord!

I will repair the chip to the nose and the nasty gash/crack on the buah pinang . This can be easily done by good keris sheath makers that I can get over here.

Yes, that certainly wouldn't distract from the provenance and should help preservation for the future.

This keris is actually NOT featured in the book but the hilt was.( The other two that I won were featured ). It is very possible that Frey knew that it was a wrong assemble and did not put it in .

I rather doubt the latter. BTW, my copy (which seems to be first printing) does not have this plate with the keris hilts (color plate #13 shows "keris art") nor the one with the keris with (possibly recycled pedang?) metal hilt.

I in fact bid for this one more for the hilt . What is curious to me is why only one side of the hilt has the golden coat 'wiped' clean? whereas the other side is fairly intact?

It is quite usual that parts that are in contact with clothes (or touched by the hand) do show considerably more wear, especially gold leaf or paint.

BTW, now that you have the hilt in your hands, what would be your estimate of the hilt's age?

Regards,
Kai

[Green]

Kai;

I posted the pic of the hilt in an fb forum hosted by a Patani keris collector and one Seller mentioned that "it was not very old" and another stated it was made in Kelantan.