Older Ivory Junggayan Kalis

[Dajak]

Hi David the best off this can be see with an pic off the kris in the scabbard
and an close up from above .

It is an shame to refurbished an old scabbard I see this also a lot with very old javanese krissen with scabbards that are at least 300 years old .


Ben

[David]

Originally Posted by Dajak

It is an shame to refurbished an old scabbard I see this also a lot with very old javanese krissen with scabbards that are at least 300 years old .

Ben, i am not necessarily arguing with your viewpoint, but if taken from the perspective i believe you might find from within the culture itself, it would be a great disrespect to the keris to allow it to live in an old beat-up wrongko. So if you are a Javanese man without the means to afford to commission a brand new wrongko, refurbishing the old one might be your best move. From the collector viewpoint we might like to see the wrongko in it's untouched condition, but as an owner from within the culture might have a different view. Of course we no doubt see many pieces refurbished strictly for sale to the collector community as well. That might well be the case with Bill's Moro kris here. Hard to say.

[Dajak]

I look it at this way the kris that we are looking at is not from an person that has no money .

So the scabbard rebefurbished but was no need because he did have money,

the only thing I can come up with that it has loose his scabbard and an new one has been made for it . (nothing wrong with it )

An Javanese kris with gold on it did not belong to the common people some
javanese krissen had more than one scabbard .


Ben

[David]

Originally Posted by Dajak

I look it at this way the kris that we are looking at is not from an person that has no money .

So the scabbard rebefurbished but was no need because he did have money,

the only thing I can come up with that it has loose his scabbard and an new one has been made for it . (nothing wrong with it )

An Javanese kris with gold on it did not belong to the common people some
javanese krissen had more than one scabbard .

Ben

Ben, i don't think that we can necessarily assume that the owner of a keris or kris in their own cultural setting is well off simply because they own a weapon that has ivory of gold on it. As you know, these weapons are often passed down through generations. Just because someone's great, great grandpa was a member of court does not necessarily translate to present day wealth. That, unfortunately, is part of the reason why we see some of these very high end kris on the market now. They are being sold off by families that are in need of money more than their heritage.

[Dajak]

Originally Posted by David

Ben, i don't think that we can necessarily assume that the owner of a keris or kris in their own cultural setting is well off simply because they own a weapon that has ivory of gold on it. As you know, these weapons are often passed down through generations. Just because someone's great, great grandpa was a member of court does not necessarily translate to present day wealth. That, unfortunately, is part of the reason why we see some of these very high end kris on the market now. They are being sold off by families that are in need of money more than their heritage.

Yes this happens but not the way you discribe if we speak about javanese
ones .

The most nice ones that are in europe are taken away by the soldiers long time ago .

Or they take a loan on the kris that they never could pay back and then it did get sold by the loanbank .

There was also in the Netherlands in 1981 an big action these krissen where bring in by An Javanese prins to sell overhere and where sold for big pices
but it was not that they where without money .

Auction april 27th - may 4th 1981 Paul Brandt in Amsterdam
name off cataloque the fascinating world of oriental art .

But the story did go that some these where not old or disputable so they where brought back to the auction house Paul Brandt .

Most off the common people did not have the money to get an kris and are not allowed to carry an high rank weapon this can be read in the historian books about Indonesia

The are even Batiks motifs that only can be carried by high rank persons .

So you are wrong if you say

that these weapons are often passed down through generations. Just because someone's great, great grandpa was a member of court does not necessarily translate to present day wealth and than sell it because they poor .

that this is the reason that they come on the market now .



Some old time kris collectors overhere passed away and the collction did get split up I have see that happend the last few years .

I have an friend that have some famous krissen in his collection that goes back to famous people of high rank and weddings gifts long time ago proven and a few out off this catalogue but the real old ones .

Ben

[David]

Originally Posted by Dajak

Yes this happens but not the way you discribe if we speak about javanese
ones .
The most nice ones that are in europe are taken away by the soldiers long time ago .
Or they take a loan on the kris that they never could pay back and then it did get sold by the loanbank .

I am not really talking about the nice ones that are in Europe. I am talking about keris that get sold in Jawa today.

Originally Posted by Dajak

There was also in the Netherlands in 1981 an big action these krissen where bring in by An Javanese prins to sell overhere and where sold for big pices
but it was not that they where without money .

Auction april 27th - may 4th 1981 Paul Brandt in Amsterdam
name off cataloque the fascinating world of oriental art .

But the story did go that some these where not old or disputable so they where brought back to the auction house Paul Brandt .

Why would a Javanese prince bring a bunch of keris to the Netherlands to sell if it was not for the money?

Originally Posted by Dajak

Most off the common people did not have the money to get an kris and are not allowed to carry an high rank weapon this can be read in the historian books about Indonesia

The are even Batiks motifs that only can be carried by high rank persons .

Yes, the "common people" were not allowed to carry keris with certain high ranking features. But many people who were of a courtly status in old Jawa or Bali (and elsewhere i am sure) do not necessarily have high status positions in modern Indonesia. Just because your great grandfather was a courtesan does not ensure current financial stability. Yet you may well still have wealth in your family pusaka. It is not usually the first course of action, but i have heard of people giving up their family keris to make ends meet. It does happen.

Originally Posted by Dajak

So you are wrong if you say

that these weapons are often passed down through generations. Just because someone's great, great grandpa was a member of court does not necessarily translate to present day wealth and than sell it because they poor .

that this is the reason that they come on the market now .

"THE" reason...not necessarily...."A" reason...i stand by that.

Originally Posted by Dajak

Some old time kris collectors overhere passed away and the collction did get split up I have see that happend the last few years .

I have an friend that have some famous krissen in his collection that goes back to famous people of high rank and weddings gifts long time ago proven and a few out off this catalogue but the real old ones .

Not every keris of worth that ends up on the market is already in some Dutch collection. There is quite a bit of dealings that take place in Jawa, between pusaka owners and Javanese collectors that we Westerners are never a part of.

[Bill M]

Originally Posted by David

Why would a Javanese prince bring a bunch of keris to the Netherlands to sell if it was not for the money?

David, It could have been that the Javanese prince got offended by someone Dutch and sold them poor keris as a joke on them.

Possibly he was mad at the auction house and was getting some kind of twisted revenge.

You know that Javanese nobility can be easily offended and have their own methods of "getting even."

But, maybe he did need money. Who knows?


But as David also said, it would be highly disprectful to a Javanese kris NOT to have new dress. But sometimes very high quality Javanese keris are in very plain, but well-made new dress. Like a beautiful woman in a simple black dress. But old-looking, patinated, dress to a Javanese old-school collector would be like having your wife in rags -- dirty rags.

Some of my best pieces, indeed my favorite, a Mataram Senopaten from the time of Sultan Agung (early 1600s) has very simple and plain recent dress.

Often fine Nihonto have a plain scabbard that holds the resting blade.

It is possible that the original scabbard got separated from this kris and this was made for a "resting place."

I have read that when a Moro commissioned a smith to make him a kris, he might ask for different things at the expense of others, ie, a very fine blade and a lesser hilt. One of the many things I like about PI Kris is the incredible diversity of these pieces.

I have some pictures for Ben, and though I did not exactly understand what he wants to see, I have made a couple of pictures.

It is unquestionable that this scabbard did have something just under the wrongko, but it looks more like it was rattan or possibly wire?

I used clamps to hold the scabbard halves together, perhaps I'll make a silver band.

[kronckew]

from what little reading i've found, moro kris and barong were meant to be used in battle, and the scabbards were generally discarded before or during battle and maybe picked up later, maybe not. they also tended to be held together by a few rattan bands such that the whole scabbarded sword could be swung at an enemy and on hitting, cutting thru the simple rattan bands, which caught many american and spanish by surprise just before they were cut in half. upshot is moro pieces might have many scabbards over a lifetime, with higher class pieces like this less likely to have their scabbard discarded and not picked up, so more likely to be repaired rather than replaced, but still more likely to be replaced than the original it was made with.

[Battara]

The other problem is that some of these scabbards did not survive the tropical environment there or even the many changes in environment once they were brought over here to the United States.