Presentation keris with gilded blade
 

I wonder how recent is this presentation Java keris?
Is it any good or just a tourist grade?

It is in pretty good condition with some patina to the silver rear side of pendok.

This is current era dress keris.

It could have been given as a present, in which case we can call it a "presentation" keris, but it was not made for this.

It typical of the bling-bling-blingy dress keris that some Indonesian people would wear.

Blade quality is low, dress quality is only middling, but just the same, it would not have been cheap.

I steer away from the term "tourist keris".

Insofar as keris are concerned this thinking is wildly out of date, about 40 or 50 years out of date, and in any case, the keris that used to be made with travellers in mind do not look anything like this.

Of its type, it is not all that bad, but it is recent (post +/-1990), and it is not good.

I see a lot of these ( the pendonk and selut are blingier than most of those we see here in the NL) around and bought a few and then traded or sold them on.

I kept one which is not “ gilded” and I like it very much.

I wanted to comment on this, I think that the great majority of these naga krises, I think, are not gilded, as in layered with gold, but they are plated with brass, I think.

Again elaborating of these krises , they seem to appear all over the place mostly with one or two nagas on the blade and they are partly or completely plated. The first two I had, I was told, were bought 35 years ago but they are certainly produced to this very day .

Tourist krises may be but they aren’t cheap and quite some work went into making them.

The person who washes my krises told me (and I have verified that they do stain green in some cases) that they are brass plated and that for this reason you can’t submerge them in warangan if you were to want to clean them to bring up the pamor somewhat because the brass will pollute the solution.

I have had 3 of those at some point, now I have one which has no plating and is only made of ferrous material (the others are only plated and they are magnetic even when covered completely of brass)