Banjarmasin keris?

[A. G. Maisey]

Probably the vast bulk of keris have been made according to established patterns:- patterns that follow the lead of either a tradition of a ruling house or of a group of people.

But sometimes a keris will be produced by a person, or in a place , where there is no established lead from either tradition or ruling house. When this happens, guidance is lacking.

The first keris that I made was certainly recognisable as a keris, but nobody could ever guess where it was produced, because although I knew very well what a keris looked like, I had not been taught the necessary elements of structure that would permit me to produce a keris that had some relationship with other keris . My first keris lacked a foundation. The same is true of every attempt at the making of a keris by any person who has not had the tuition of an established maker, and who is working outside a community with a keris tradition.

In my personal collection I have several similar keris. Keris that have been produced by somebody who had no tradition to draw upon. The makers had seen a keris, and they produced something that was keris-like, but it did not conform to a tradition.

Possibly what we are looking at here has a similar history:- a keris produced outside any recognisable tradition. Look at the individual elements:- a straight gonjo that is almost nguceng mati, but not Tuban, additionally the material seems not to be the same as the iron in the blade, and a different hand cut the attempt at a greneng than cut the greneng features in the blade; the kembang kacang looks a bit like nggelung wayang but doesn't quite make it; the proportions are not in conformity with anything I can recognise; it has pamor, but the maker had no idea at all of how to manage pamor.

So --- did this maker have any guidance or tradition to draw upon?

I doubt it.

The wrongko looks like a mixture of different elements. Since one of the functions of a wrongko is to provide an item of dress that conforms to dress in its particular area, and since this wrongko does not conform to any dress standard that I have seen, I'm only prepared to agree that yes, it is a wrongko.

Similar story with the hilt. It mimics some elements that appear in Central Javanese hilts, but all that additional ornamentation is not a part of anything I know.

Overall, this looks like a Javanese keris to my eye, but not of a Javanese tradition. I'd be inclined to classify the whole thing as folk art:- a collaboration between somebody who wanted or needed a keris and the village smith. Lots of little isolated villages in Central Jawa, even now. What would it have been like 100 or so years ago?

Actually, I rather like these keris that don't follow a tradition. They possibly get closer to the feeling of the people than any elite art work adorned with gold ever has any hope of doing.

The mendak is North Coast/Madura.

One question:- is the gandar from a single piece of wood, or is it from two pieces of wood that have been joined?