My first kris :)

[migueldiaz]

First of all, thanks again to all who have supported my new addiction, I mean addition , to my humble collection

Can I ask a follow up question, please?

Is the number of waves in an authentic kris supposedly odd and not even, or perhaps that is not necessarily the case?

Because in Herbert Krieger's (1926) description of krisses found in the now-Smithsonian Institute, per Krieger's textual description of five krisses, in fact three out of five have even-numbered waves.

Thanks in advance.

[David]

Originally Posted by migueldiaz

Is the number of waves in an authentic kris supposedly odd and not even, or perhaps that is not necessarily the case?

Because in Herbert Krieger's (1926) description of krisses found in the now-Smithsonian Institute, per Krieger's textual description of five krisses, in fact three out of five have even-numbered waves.

Krieger probably did not count correctly or did not take into account blade erosion that would make the kris appear to have one less wave.
As far as i know kris and keris always have an odd wave count.

[migueldiaz]

Originally Posted by David

Krieger probably did not count correctly or did not take into account blade erosion that would make the kris appear to have one less wave.
As far as i know kris and keris always have an odd wave count.

Hi David,

Thanks for the comment.

In the attached pic of one of Krieger's plates, krisses nos. 1 & 3 seem to have even-numbered wave counts. Or would there be another way of counting the waves?

Thanks again.

[Rick]

#1. is 5 waves .

#3. is 13 waves .

Count from the greneng/wide side of the blade .

[David]

I concur, 5 on #1, 13 on #3.

[David]

Originally Posted by Rick

Count from the greneng/wide side of the blade .

Actually Rick, don't you mean to say that you should start your count from the other side, from the first curve just above the "elephant trunk"?

[migueldiaz]

Now I get it.

Thanks Rick and David!

[Rick]

Originally Posted by David

Actually Rick, don't you mean to say that you should start your count from the other side, from the first curve just above the "elephant trunk"?

It's funny how we can both come up with the same # using different ways to count .

I tend to do things backwards ....

[migueldiaz]

[... momentarily pondering whether there is more to life than counting the number of waves of certain edged weapons ...]

Going back to Krieger's manner of counting the waves, apparently he counts the pairs of waves, and not the individual waves.

Thus in the attached photo in his book, in the text he described certain blades as follows:

[1] Blade No. 1: two waves;
[2] Blade No. 5: five waves; and
[3] Blade No. 7: eleven waves.

I'm not saying Krieger's manner of counting should be it. I'm just pointing out the way he did it