New Panabas

[Robert]

A few new pictures after a little cleaning. I'm not sure if they are any better than the first ones or if the are worse. The brighter part of the brass is from where I was holding on to it when cleaning the rust from the laminated blade. Sorry that I couldn't get better pictures of the blade but it was getting dark when they were being taken and the flash made a mess of things.The brass was just washed off with soapy ammonia and a wet rag.

Robert

[Robert]

A friend suggested to me that the end of the hilt on this was probably covered by a decorative cap originally. Now after looking at most if not all of the panabas pictures posted on this forum as well as every one I could find on the net I tend to agree. It does looks as though the ones of these that were covered or mostly covered by decorative or even plain panels and bands had a good possibility of the end of the hilt being be capped as well. Below is a picture of the hilt of a panabas that was originally posted by CharlesS (I hope you don't mind) that shows this, while having the same amount of bands (though these are silver where mine are brass) securing the blade to the haft, as well has having decorative panels that look to be very close if not identical to the ones used on mine. Comments on this as well as any other information you can offer would be greatly appreciated. My thanks to those who have commented so far.

Robert

P.S.
I have added a picture of this new panabas with his brother who has been living with my wife and I for a few months now.

[Robert]

Well, I hate to post without really anything new to say but I was hoping that someone else might have an opinion on this panabas that they would like to share. I know that there are quite a few other members here on the forum that have these and thought that because I am totally out of my comfort zone on Moro items (seeing that my collection is focused almost totally on Luzon items) that maybe some of them would be willing to chime in with their opinions. Again, I would like to thank the ones who have helped so far and say that any help that anyone else can other offer will be greatly appreciated.

Robert

[Rick]

Hi Robert,
Judging from the picture you borrowed from Charles I can see no actual 'cap' on his piece .

I'm not so sure your example is missing anything .

[Sajen]

I am with Rick, don't think that there ever have been an endcap.

[Robert]

Hello Rick and thank you for your help. The picture I posted of Charles panabas was more for the comparison of the okir on the panels and the number of bands being used. There are more pictures of ones that look to have the end of the hilt caped including the two examples below. The first one is Bill M's and looks to have an iron cap and the other is Ian's and looks to have a brass cap. Again I hope that no one minds my using their pictures. On my example the last panel on the end of the hilt definitely shows a broken solder seam that makes me think that a piece is missing. Seeing that none of the other bands and panels look to have ever been soldered together at any point, it would indicate to me that it could have had either another of the narrow bands with the raised dots or a combination of that and a cap that would have covered the end of the hilt. This of course is all just speculation on my part.

Robert