A different Pamor which is not folded but pasted

A. G. Maisey · 18th August 2024, 11:48 PM

Which blade Gustav, the original Bali blade in post #1?

Actually, the meaning that Haryoguritno gives "gedhagen" (not gedheghan", this is a different word, not a variant spelling) is quite different to the meaning given by Basuki Yuwono and by my Solo informant.

Standard Javanese terminology for the Solo reflective pamor is "nginden".

In a Bali wosing wutah gedhegen we are talking about a wos wutah variation that has upright strips , uncontrolled and something like adeg in appearence, but not in construction.

However, if you mean that the pamor in the Bali blade in post #1 cannot have been created from a random pattern pamor with surface manipulation, this assumption is very wrong. The carving of a blade with unevenly distributed layers of pamor will of course create the effect we see in this blade, of a continuation of the same line of pamor across the top of the odo-odo, those layers of pamor run side to side and the layers do not maintain even thickness during forging.

Gustav, it is pretty much as I said to HughChen in my post #24, there are far too many variables to get accurate answers from a finished blade, especially so if we have not had the requisite training in pattern welding. We can guess, but even to guess & with the right training & experience it is not easy in all cases.

Gustav · 19th August 2024, 05:18 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by A. G. Maisey

However, if you mean that the pamor in the Bali blade in post #1 cannot have been created from a random pattern pamor with surface manipulation, this assumption is very wrong. The carving of a blade with unevenly distributed layers of pamor will of course create the effect we see in this blade, of a continuation of the same line of pamor across the top of the odo-odo, those layers of pamor run side to side and the layers do not maintain even thickness during forging.

Alan, I think we got stuck again. In my #12 I attached a picture of this blade (of course I am speaking about the blade of Hugh), where pamor lines run diagonally across the odo-odo, a feature, which would be compatible with pamor made of twisted bar. In #21 there is a picture, where pamor lines cross the odo-odo just above the poyuhan, and are those of a twisted bar. Those lines are not compatible with pamor mlumah, even manipulated.

A. G. Maisey · 19th August 2024, 09:45 AM

Yes Gustav, I did misunderstand the part of the blade and the characteristic you were referring to.

Those diagonal lines shown in the post #12 pic can easily be created by surface manipulation, or even by irregular striking on a native style anvil, or where stones were used instead of an anvil & hammer, or by use of an old & abused European anvil. We are not dealing with European standards.

As recently as the early 1990's, I saw a pande besi who was working on the outskirts of Karangpandan --- slopes of Mt. Lawu --- who was using stones as both hammer & anvil, his wife & daughter were his strikers.

The technology that existed & still exists in some parts of Jawa & Bali, & certainly in other parts of Indonesia, can be pretty primitive, & very often the results are not predictable. When I visited Pande Made Wija ( Pande Ketut Mudra's father) in 1982 his forge was just a shallow depression in the ground, & side blown from an ububan, his fire bed was no more than 5 or 6 inches deep.

In your post #21, the pic of the sorsoran that has a square enclosing some circles and some wavy lines that run across the blade. The lines across the blade can be created by upsetting & also by addition of extra material during the forging process, if for example we add that extra material at about fold 2 or 3 or 4, there will be no weld joint seen in the finished job.

The circles can be created by punch work.

The blade section enclosed by the square & directly above the poyuhan displays characteristics that can most definitely be created in a m'lumah base by manipulation.

These things that I have mentioned, I myself have done, not working in pamor, but working in damascus.

We can hypothesise as much as we like, but Gustav, I've done this sort of work, & I've seen it done, and based upon what I can see, and ignoring what I cannot see, there is nothing in this pamor motif that cannot be done by manipulation & addition. But still, I have no problem with you continuing to hold your own opinion.

I said some time back, that I do understand why you or somebody else might think that the motif is the result of miring work, but when I see something that has the characteristics of work that I've done myself, its a bit difficult for me to accept that it was not done in a similar way. Having said that, I do acknowledge that there could be a number of different approaches to creating the same finished job from a m'lumah billet, without going to the expense of miring work --- & the creation of pamor miring is very expensive.

With a lot of the pamor work & keris work that still comes out of Jawa & Madura --- I am not mentioning Bali & this is intentional --- it is not really possible to understand how something has been done unless we have observed it being done.

Gustav · 19th August 2024, 12:41 PM

Alan, thank you for your elaborated response, I much appreciate it.

A. G. Maisey · 19th August 2024, 01:49 PM

HughChen, nearly all old keris words in Jawa are Javanese, not Indonesian.

Bahasa Indonesia is actually a Malay dialect, or maybe "Malay based" might be more correct. When we find Malay terms used with Javanese keris, usually those terms are a recent addition to the keris vocabulary.

However, the words used for keris are not set in stone. Terms & understandings vary from place to place & from time to time. To understand all the terms we probably need a good understanding of Javanese & Bahasa Indonesia, & the ability to work with half a dozen other languages or dialects.

Javanese itself is not a standardised language & it has three major levels of language, and more than 8 other levels that are only used in certain places and for certain occasions.

1、mlumah --- laying down, face up

2、Miring --- slanting, at an angle

3、Puntiran --- twisted

4、Odo-Odo --- central rib of a blade

5、wos wutah (beras wutah, wosing/wusing wutah) --- beras(wos)uncooked rice, wutah= spilled, scattered

6、wusing wutah gedhegan--- wusing wutah= Balinese term for wos wutah, gedhegan= like a panel of woven bambu (root word is gedeg/gedheg)

7、nginden = i do not know a dictionary translation for this word, nor if it has any other use apart from being a keris related word I understand it as "reflective" or "chatoyant", "chatoyant" is from the French, it means "like the eye of a cat"

8、woven = English word, bambu = bamboo, wos wutah= as above

9、Batik = traditional Javanese cloth, motif "nam gedheg" = name of a batik motif that resembles woven bambu --- it actually does not, but if you use your artistic imagination you can see the resemblance. Many different ways to interpret this motif, some do look like woven bambu, most do not.

This might be useful:-
http://www.kerisattosanaji.com/keris-glossary

HughChen · 20th August 2024, 04:30 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by A. G. Maisey

HughChen, nearly all old keris words in Jawa are Javanese, not Indonesian.

Bahasa Indonesia is actually a Malay dialect, or maybe "Malay based" might be more correct. When we find Malay terms used with Javanese keris, usually those terms are a recent addition to the keris vocabulary.

However, the words used for keris are not set in stone. Terms & understandings vary from place to place & from time to time. To understand all the terms we probably need a good understanding of Javanese & Bahasa Indonesia, & the ability to work with half a dozen other languages or dialects.

Javanese itself is not a standardised language & it has three major levels of language, and more than 8 other levels that are only used in certain places and for certain occasions.

1、mlumah --- laying down, face up

2、Miring --- slanting, at an angle

3、Puntiran --- twisted

4、Odo-Odo --- central rib of a blade

5、wos wutah (beras wutah, wosing/wusing wutah) --- beras(wos)uncooked rice, wutah= spilled, scattered

6、wusing wutah gedhegan--- wusing wutah= Balinese term for wos wutah, gedhegan= like a panel of woven bambu (root word is gedeg/gedheg)

7、nginden = i do not know a dictionary translation for this word, nor if it has any other use apart from being a keris related word I understand it as "reflective" or "chatoyant", "chatoyant" is from the French, it means "like the eye of a cat"

8、woven = English word, bambu = bamboo, wos wutah= as above

9、Batik = traditional Javanese cloth, motif "nam gedheg" = name of a batik motif that resembles woven bambu --- it actually does not, but if you use your artistic imagination you can see the resemblance. Many different ways to interpret this motif, some do look like woven bambu, most do not.

This might be useful:-
http://www.kerisattosanaji.com/keris-glossary

Thank you, Alan, it's very helpful!

HughChen · 20th August 2024, 04:39 AM

One more question about this Bali sword. We can observe some damaged dents on this Keris, which may have resulted from later use and collisions. However, it's intriguing that the damaged areas of the sword still remian the same black color as the surface. It is known that the black surface of Keris comes from a soaking process after forging, so the black color on the surface should not penetrate into the interior. Then why is the interior of the scratch still black after the surface has been damaged? Does it has any relationship with the material?

A. G. Maisey · 22nd August 2024, 12:09 AM

I cannot see any actual dents in the blade. There are a few irregularities a few areas where rust has caused some blade erosion, but dents I cannot find.

Dents can appear because of the loss of a piece of lamination, or because of a large area of untreated rust. Prior to staining Balinese blades are polished, and this polish & then stain process occurs pretty regularly, for some keris it might occur every year.

In respect of staining, the usual commercial blade stain is normally done by soaking, but the staining process for single blades is a hands on process, & the stain process for valuable or highly esteemed blades is different again. I do not like the usual result from the soak method of staining, & it seems to not last as long as the other more labour intensive ways of staining a blade.

18th August 2024, 11:48 PM	#1
A. G. Maisey Member Join Date: May 2006 Posts: 6,992	Which blade Gustav, the original Bali blade in post #1? Actually, the meaning that Haryoguritno gives "gedhagen" (not gedheghan", this is a different word, not a variant spelling) is quite different to the meaning given by Basuki Yuwono and by my Solo informant. Standard Javanese terminology for the Solo reflective pamor is "nginden". In a Bali wosing wutah gedhegen we are talking about a wos wutah variation that has upright strips , uncontrolled and something like adeg in appearence, but not in construction. However, if you mean that the pamor in the Bali blade in post #1 cannot have been created from a random pattern pamor with surface manipulation, this assumption is very wrong. The carving of a blade with unevenly distributed layers of pamor will of course create the effect we see in this blade, of a continuation of the same line of pamor across the top of the odo-odo, those layers of pamor run side to side and the layers do not maintain even thickness during forging. Gustav, it is pretty much as I said to HughChen in my post #24, there are far too many variables to get accurate answers from a finished blade, especially so if we have not had the requisite training in pattern welding. We can guess, but even to guess & with the right training & experience it is not easy in all cases. Last edited by A. G. Maisey; 19th August 2024 at 12:12 AM.

19th August 2024, 09:45 AM	#3
A. G. Maisey Member Join Date: May 2006 Posts: 6,992	Yes Gustav, I did misunderstand the part of the blade and the characteristic you were referring to. Those diagonal lines shown in the post #12 pic can easily be created by surface manipulation, or even by irregular striking on a native style anvil, or where stones were used instead of an anvil & hammer, or by use of an old & abused European anvil. We are not dealing with European standards. As recently as the early 1990's, I saw a pande besi who was working on the outskirts of Karangpandan --- slopes of Mt. Lawu --- who was using stones as both hammer & anvil, his wife & daughter were his strikers. The technology that existed & still exists in some parts of Jawa & Bali, & certainly in other parts of Indonesia, can be pretty primitive, & very often the results are not predictable. When I visited Pande Made Wija ( Pande Ketut Mudra's father) in 1982 his forge was just a shallow depression in the ground, & side blown from an ububan, his fire bed was no more than 5 or 6 inches deep. In your post #21, the pic of the sorsoran that has a square enclosing some circles and some wavy lines that run across the blade. The lines across the blade can be created by upsetting & also by addition of extra material during the forging process, if for example we add that extra material at about fold 2 or 3 or 4, there will be no weld joint seen in the finished job. The circles can be created by punch work. The blade section enclosed by the square & directly above the poyuhan displays characteristics that can most definitely be created in a m'lumah base by manipulation. These things that I have mentioned, I myself have done, not working in pamor, but working in damascus. We can hypothesise as much as we like, but Gustav, I've done this sort of work, & I've seen it done, and based upon what I can see, and ignoring what I cannot see, there is nothing in this pamor motif that cannot be done by manipulation & addition. But still, I have no problem with you continuing to hold your own opinion. I said some time back, that I do understand why you or somebody else might think that the motif is the result of miring work, but when I see something that has the characteristics of work that I've done myself, its a bit difficult for me to accept that it was not done in a similar way. Having said that, I do acknowledge that there could be a number of different approaches to creating the same finished job from a m'lumah billet, without going to the expense of miring work --- & the creation of pamor miring is very expensive. With a lot of the pamor work & keris work that still comes out of Jawa & Madura --- I am not mentioning Bali & this is intentional --- it is not really possible to understand how something has been done unless we have observed it being done.

19th August 2024, 12:41 PM	#4
Gustav Member Join Date: Jun 2009 Posts: 1,273	Alan, thank you for your elaborated response, I much appreciate it.

19th August 2024, 01:49 PM	#5
A. G. Maisey Member Join Date: May 2006 Posts: 6,992	HughChen, nearly all old keris words in Jawa are Javanese, not Indonesian. Bahasa Indonesia is actually a Malay dialect, or maybe "Malay based" might be more correct. When we find Malay terms used with Javanese keris, usually those terms are a recent addition to the keris vocabulary. However, the words used for keris are not set in stone. Terms & understandings vary from place to place & from time to time. To understand all the terms we probably need a good understanding of Javanese & Bahasa Indonesia, & the ability to work with half a dozen other languages or dialects. Javanese itself is not a standardised language & it has three major levels of language, and more than 8 other levels that are only used in certain places and for certain occasions. 1、mlumah --- laying down, face up 2、Miring --- slanting, at an angle 3、Puntiran --- twisted 4、Odo-Odo --- central rib of a blade 5、wos wutah (beras wutah, wosing/wusing wutah) --- beras(wos)uncooked rice, wutah= spilled, scattered 6、wusing wutah gedhegan--- wusing wutah= Balinese term for wos wutah, gedhegan= like a panel of woven bambu (root word is gedeg/gedheg) 7、nginden = i do not know a dictionary translation for this word, nor if it has any other use apart from being a keris related word I understand it as "reflective" or "chatoyant", "chatoyant" is from the French, it means "like the eye of a cat" 8、woven = English word, bambu = bamboo, wos wutah= as above 9、Batik = traditional Javanese cloth, motif "nam gedheg" = name of a batik motif that resembles woven bambu --- it actually does not, but if you use your artistic imagination you can see the resemblance. Many different ways to interpret this motif, some do look like woven bambu, most do not. This might be useful:- http://www.kerisattosanaji.com/keris-glossary

20th August 2024, 04:39 AM	#7
HughChen Member Join Date: Aug 2024 Location: China Posts: 155	One more question about this Bali sword. We can observe some damaged dents on this Keris, which may have resulted from later use and collisions. However, it's intriguing that the damaged areas of the sword still remian the same black color as the surface. It is known that the black surface of Keris comes from a soaking process after forging, so the black color on the surface should not penetrate into the interior. Then why is the interior of the scratch still black after the surface has been damaged? Does it has any relationship with the material?

22nd August 2024, 12:09 AM	#8
A. G. Maisey Member Join Date: May 2006 Posts: 6,992	I cannot see any actual dents in the blade. There are a few irregularities a few areas where rust has caused some blade erosion, but dents I cannot find. Dents can appear because of the loss of a piece of lamination, or because of a large area of untreated rust. Prior to staining Balinese blades are polished, and this polish & then stain process occurs pretty regularly, for some keris it might occur every year. In respect of staining, the usual commercial blade stain is normally done by soaking, but the staining process for single blades is a hands on process, & the stain process for valuable or highly esteemed blades is different again. I do not like the usual result from the soak method of staining, & it seems to not last as long as the other more labour intensive ways of staining a blade.