Errors in Keris Literature

Alam Shah · 1st August 2007, 07:53 AM

Hmmm... ok, let's proceeding with caution...

discuss point by point.

Alan, the main reason for this thread is to analyse... not to criticise the authors, most had spent considerable amount of time, effort and passion to present us with good books, not perfect but worthy of reference. For that, I salute these authors.

However, there are parts that are not correct or in the 'grey' areas. These are the one I feel needs addressing... rather than just ignoring it, others might use it as reference and gets lost along the way... worse still if this distorted piece of information is presented as the truth.

Here, we can look at the matter from many perspective... at least we try to find out why the authors wrote it such, in what context... reason... based of fact, folklore, research findings... etc.

Since ganjawulung had brought these up, from MBRAS "The Keris and Other Malay Weapons" (1998), lets start with these...

A. G. Maisey · 1st August 2007, 08:52 AM

Alam Shah, without the smallest difficulty I can find things in any book on keris that do not agree with my understandings.

My understandings have in most cases come from people whom have been considered authorities in their own right.

Some of my understandings have come from my own observations or investigations.

Now, if I identify something in some author's work, and I say :- "Such and such is incorrect", then I feel that I really should qualify that statement by providing a framework to support my disagreement.I do not think it is good enough to simply say that something is wrong because we all believe it to be wrong at any particular time.

As far as getting lost along the way, I personally think we are all pretty much wandering like blind men in the wilderness. Occasionally one may stumble across something that is perhaps more or less true in some given context, but for the most part the true essence of the keris is possibly lost beyond recall.

If these instances of incorrectness that we supposedly need to address are simple things such as names, current usages, or beliefs current when something was written, well, that's fairly lightweight stuff, and can probably be handled by listing those things which some author may have presented and presenting alongside it our own belief, which may or may not be as incorrect as that of the author.

Thus, if we are to address these things point by point, how about putting up for discussion a single major "error" of some writer, and let us have a look at it. Please, no minor things:- I wrote a 14 page letter to one author on inaccuracies in his text that could have been avoided if he had only used a competent reviewer prior to publication. Lets look at hardcore misstatements of what we currently believe to be fact.

1st August 2007, 07:53 AM	#1
Alam Shah Member Join Date: Jan 2005 Location: Singapore Posts: 1,248	Hmmm... ok, let's proceeding with caution... discuss point by point. Alan, the main reason for this thread is to analyse... not to criticise the authors, most had spent considerable amount of time, effort and passion to present us with good books, not perfect but worthy of reference. For that, I salute these authors. However, there are parts that are not correct or in the 'grey' areas. These are the one I feel needs addressing... rather than just ignoring it, others might use it as reference and gets lost along the way... worse still if this distorted piece of information is presented as the truth. Here, we can look at the matter from many perspective... at least we try to find out why the authors wrote it such, in what context... reason... based of fact, folklore, research findings... etc. Since ganjawulung had brought these up, from MBRAS "The Keris and Other Malay Weapons" (1998), lets start with these...

1st August 2007, 08:52 AM	#2
A. G. Maisey Member Join Date: May 2006 Posts: 7,043	Alam Shah, without the smallest difficulty I can find things in any book on keris that do not agree with my understandings. My understandings have in most cases come from people whom have been considered authorities in their own right. Some of my understandings have come from my own observations or investigations. Now, if I identify something in some author's work, and I say :- "Such and such is incorrect", then I feel that I really should qualify that statement by providing a framework to support my disagreement.I do not think it is good enough to simply say that something is wrong because we all believe it to be wrong at any particular time. As far as getting lost along the way, I personally think we are all pretty much wandering like blind men in the wilderness. Occasionally one may stumble across something that is perhaps more or less true in some given context, but for the most part the true essence of the keris is possibly lost beyond recall. If these instances of incorrectness that we supposedly need to address are simple things such as names, current usages, or beliefs current when something was written, well, that's fairly lightweight stuff, and can probably be handled by listing those things which some author may have presented and presenting alongside it our own belief, which may or may not be as incorrect as that of the author. Thus, if we are to address these things point by point, how about putting up for discussion a single major "error" of some writer, and let us have a look at it. Please, no minor things:- I wrote a 14 page letter to one author on inaccuracies in his text that could have been avoided if he had only used a competent reviewer prior to publication. Lets look at hardcore misstatements of what we currently believe to be fact.