The Philip Tom article on the Paiwan swords

yuanzhumin · 7th May 2010, 11:25 AM

Kukulza, I sincerely hope you'll find a quality Paiwan knife one day. They are rare and like what is rare, they have a price. The challenge is first to find one, a good one, and then to be able to finance the buying -- not an easy task !
Yes, good question concerning iron making. The iron making was known in the island long ago, but it seems that mysteriously the tradition was lost !!? Then came the barter for blades with the non aboriginal settlers ! In this case, there are more questions than answers. The question is the same with pottery making and jade crafting : these techniques were known and mastered early in the island and exported to the whole Asia and Pacific, but then they were forgotten in the island itself -- only few groups were still able to do their own pottery in the 19th cent. Most of the other groups used pottery that was passed from generation to generation or obtained through barter. Why ?

7th May 2010, 11:25 AM	#3
yuanzhumin Member Join Date: Sep 2005 Location: Ex-Taipei, Taiwan, now in Shanghai, China Posts: 180	Kukulza, I sincerely hope you'll find a quality Paiwan knife one day. They are rare and like what is rare, they have a price. The challenge is first to find one, a good one, and then to be able to finance the buying -- not an easy task ! Yes, good question concerning iron making. The iron making was known in the island long ago, but it seems that mysteriously the tradition was lost !!? Then came the barter for blades with the non aboriginal settlers ! In this case, there are more questions than answers. The question is the same with pottery making and jade crafting : these techniques were known and mastered early in the island and exported to the whole Asia and Pacific, but then they were forgotten in the island itself -- only few groups were still able to do their own pottery in the 19th cent. Most of the other groups used pottery that was passed from generation to generation or obtained through barter. Why ?