Some Philippines kris from my collection

[tom hyle]

I do not see any indication of a seperate ganga on the kris in question. Can you explain your position? I see what looks like a faked line defined chiefly or entirely by the ends of the chevron inlays all being in a line. Iras ganga kris sundang usually have a faked line of some sort.......I don't see this line continuing out across the long rear arm of the ganga, where there are no inlays.

[kai]

I do not see any indication of a seperate ganga on the kris in question.

Tom, I do guess that all 3 kris have a seperate gangya. The pic seems to indicate a possibly true separation line with corrosion restricted to the blade at the base of the chevron to the right. The position of the line finishing at the scrollwork seems a little odd though.


Carlos needs to verify this by closely examining the pieces, preferably with a good magnifying glass: usually in pieces with seperate gangya the metal exhibits forging marks/impurities/corrosion that stop at the separation line while in pieces with no seperate gangya you'll usually find some that extend over any "faked" separation line (can be tough when modern steels were utilized without decent forging - stock removal would indicate a late low-quality piece which this kris obviously isn't is).

Regards,
Kai

[tom hyle]

Moreover the folded grain on the blade is along the blade on a kris, while on the ganga the grain runs across the blade (along the ganga) moreover the colour of the metal is occasionally notably different, though more usually the ganga seems almost to have been made from a (deliberately of course) left over piece of the blade.
You are right; that vague shadowy line does run a bit oddly for a ganga line, though it finishes in a gap/division in the okar, which is interesting. Also, it seems too wide and cloudy for a real or even deliberately faked line, perhaps. I suspect it is some kind of rust shadow.

[tom hyle]

On the other hand I do now see the little line fragment you're pointing out coming off the one one chevron. Hmmmm!!!! But consider it seems to parrallel one of those curved lines (what are they representative of? Scales? Clouds?.......)........