Origin of the Tombak?

[katana]

Originally Posted by Bill M

David, can't quite make the jump. Copper?

Hi Bill ,
I was researching brass/bronze alloys and came across this information. Because of the linguistist use of 'tombak' (Javanese)to describe this alloy, I thought I would include it here......the reasoning is, that from I can see, there seems to be no definitive description of what makes a tombak different to a lembing. A number of formites believe that a tombak, by definition has methuk ....which are, in my very limited experience, often made from a brass like alloy.....perhaps this was more common in earlier times....and as a descriptive term tombak was used to describe a spear with methuk....perhaps, for instance they could have been originally called a tombak lembing / lembing tombak ....which was gradually shortened to just tombak.

It was just a though.....which may or may not 'create' other avenues for discussion.

All the best
Regards David