Yep, I agree with you David.
A few posts back I considered starting a new thread to discuss all this age & symbolism stuff, but I've had a bit on my plate recently and I didn't do it.
If, as moderator, you have the ability to begin a thread and move these possibly irrelevant posts to it, why not do so? Then Gustav and I and anybody else who felt like it could ramble on about symbols and icons and etc, etc, etc to our hearts content and upset nobody.
But you know the way it is:- you start off talking about the weather to somebody, and before you know where you are you're discussing Einstein's Theory of Relativity, and from there the discussion jumps to the problems involved in restoring steam locomotives --- and availability of good coking coal, and what 7X5 box trailer full of beach sand weighs --- this sort of diversion never stops. That's what happens with non-formal discussions:- they wander all over the place --- and this Forum is a venue for informal discussion, so discussions are bound to get off the tracks from time to time.
On the subject of those hilts I posted pics of:- all three are fairly old, but I have no idea how old, the one with the gemstone bandul around his neck is by far the oldest, if judged on construction and appearance. All are known in Jawa as either nyamba or minat jenggul.
Oh yes --- we cannot have a yoni without a lingga in Hindu, or Hindu-Jawa iconography. This situation could be read as something extremely unlucky. Lingga = male, yoni = female, lingga+yoni = universal stability, one without the other? not good, not good at all. Lots of ways to read this singularity if it intentionally occurred, but basically what you have is the collapse of the cosmos.
So --- if we think we see an intentional lingga by itself, or an intentional yoni by itself, maybe we should pause a moment and ask if we understand what we think we are seeing.
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