A very, very old Moro kris

[Sajen]

Originally Posted by David

I could be off base as the Moro kris is really only a secondary interest for me (in spite of the fact that it was a Moro kris that indeed started me on my current addiction), but i wonder if this kris is not just very old instead of "very, very old". I mean, yes, it is obviously an old kris in what we know as the "archaic" form, but when i look at the gangya i see this series of holes where on a kris from the 17th centry or older i would expect to see actual greneng. Of course, i have seen this before, but on later kris. Also extent of the 45 degree angle rise at the end of the gangya seems to me to be a later development. My thought would therefore be 18th century. Dress could be 19th or even early 20th C. Nice find Ian.

Agree with David on this point. What I would consider as a very, very old kris is this one: http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showth...highlight=kris

Regards,
Detlef

[Rafngard]

My one Archaic kris seems to have the same gap, though to a lessor extent.

Have fun,
Leif

[Ian]

Today I visited a veterinarian friend who has an X-ray machine. By cranking the machine up to 90kV and 0.5 mA I was able to get some very respectable views of the tang through the silver wrap on the handle. I first positioned the blade flat on the plate, 0º, and then took pictures at 30º, 45º, 60º and 90º of rotation from the horizontal plane. I expanded each digital image and referenced measurements to the diameter of the silver wrap at the same point. By measuring the width of the tang and of the silver wrap at several points along the tang in each of these views, I found that the tang diameter at each position was the same in all views [within the precision of my measurements (± 0.2 mm)]. This effectively excludes a flattened or square tang construction, leaving a tapering round tang as the remaining possibility.

Unfortunately, the image files were too large for my thumb drive, so I will have to go back next week and retrieve the images. I will post them here once they have been resized.