Like Rick i grew up on the ocean (or close enough to get to in a 20 min. car ride) in an area that historically saw a lot of sailing, boat building, fishing etc. I suppose i had very early dreams of going to sea and found fascination at a young age with whalers and their travels to exotic places like the South Seas. Read Moby Dick and Treasure Island at a very young age and devoured historical books on whaling and pirates. So right there i suppose there is the set-up for a love of the South Seas and swords. But this does seem, at least to me, to be a bit of a given for most children, at least in the western world. Sort of like my early interest in dinosaurs. I mean, isn't that every small boy's interest.
I have also always had a very strong interest in anything old, so even as a kid i loved kicking around flea markets and antique stores. They have always been like museums to me, except that if you have the money you can actually buy the stuff and bring it home with you.
But even people's old junk is interesting to me, appealing, i suppose, to the sociologist is me.
Now i also have always had a strong interest in science, the stars, space travel and science fiction. Again, not all that strange for small boy growing up in the American culture. I have also been a collector of things since i was very young and have always collected rocks, fossils, shells, coins, stamps, feathers, old bottles, old cameras, etc. Yes, this drives my wife crazy as i still have substantial amounts of all these collections about the house.
As a teenager i began to find interest in eastern philosophies and mysticism. My mom used to read stories of Greek mythology, Native American legends and folktales to me as a child that were all packed with acts of remarkable deeds and magick. This led me onto a spiritual path and a strong interest in the concepts of magick and how different cultures apply themselves to magick and the search for spiritual connection. So this has been a focus of study for me for the past 35 years.
So, one fine day in 1981 i was on vacation in New Hampshire and i was kicking around an antiques flea market. I discovered a Moro kris that just grabbed my attention and imagination. Neither i nor the seller had any clue what it was, but of course i had to have it. I was living in NYC at the time so when i got home i took it into the curator at the Metropolitan Museum of Art to find out what i had bought. He IDed it as Moro and somewhat misleadingly discribed them as pirates and spoke just a bit about the mystical connection the Moros had with these swords. I had to know more, but i didn't have much luck. No too much later a self-styled "shaman" friend of mine was leaving town and wanting to lighten his load. He knew of my interest in my Moro kris and offered to sell me a Javanese keris he had. I could see the connection in the blade form, but didn't really fully understand it at the time. Still, i had a hard time finding any information, not really knowing where to look. Then i just happened to find a Hilton Horizons travel magazine that a street book vendor was selling with 2 javanese keris on the cover. Inside was the article "Beauty, Magic and Powers of the Keris" with numerous full page color photos. It describes a number of legends of the keris and the (again misleading) notion that all keris were made from meteoric pamor. So we now have this incredible convergence of life long interests for me. The South Seas, pirates, magick and mysticism, heroic legends of valor, glory and bravery and, last, but not least, star metal from outer space. And as if to add just one more synchronicity i come to discover that one of the early accepted published works on keris was written by Gardner who i was already well aware of as the father of modern Wicca. Gentlemen, i think this is what is commonly referred to as "The Perfect Storm".
It took a few more years until i discovered the internet before my collection really began to flourish. I must say that i blame this site.
The only other reference i had managed to find up until then is the wonderful coffee table book Court Arts of Indonesia, but stumbling upon this place was like a godsend.....well, perhaps not for my pocket book. From 1981 - 2004 i had collected only the 2 blades. Since then i have added well over 50 blades to my collection.
