Twisted rods

[David]

Here is another Bali dressed keris with pamor tangkis. I am curious what the consensus might be on the origins of this blade. It is perfectly fitted to the sarong so clearly this dress was made specifically for the blade. Length is jusrt shy of 38cm.

[A. G. Maisey]

This is a brief summary taken from Surakarta sources of indicators for a keris blade made in Madura:-

coarse iron,

thick pamor, distinct step from iron to contrasting pamor material ( this is not evident when a blade is polished),

rotan (rattan) shaped cross section,

rather upright,

penitis/penatas (this is the absolute point) is too small,

distance from final luk to point is long,

gonjo is ugly-rather straight, looks awkward, buntut urang narrow & small,

gandhik is short, low, small, thin,

usually no tikel alis,

very small kembang kacang,

blumbangan not well defined,

odo-odo rarely found,

kruwingen shallow if it exists at all,

wadidang runs on middle line

Madura work is overall very poor work, only the work of Mpu Koso is any good, Mpu Macan was also good, but his production was very small.

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This is a summary of a summary, & that initial summary was compiled from my notes for my guidance, more as memory hooks than as a guide book.

The above is the way in which a very highly respected ahli keris in Surakarta during the period from about 1970 through to about 2010 would look at and assess characteristics in order to form an opinion on whether or not a keris blade had been made in Madura. It was not, is not necessary to get a 100% agreement, the opinion is formed upon balance of characteristics. The period I have named is what I know for certain from personal experience, but if we go back to earlier sources we will find similar indicators mentioned.

Historically Bali has had strong ties with Madura, & still does. King Baturengang had the desire of conquest & colonisation, but this did not eventuate, however, from the late 16th century, & seemingly continuing for a very long time thereafter, there were a number of small Balinese incursions into Madura, and there are some small areas of Madura where the inhabitants are of Balinese mixed descent.

It is not at all unusual to find Madura & Javanese keris in Balinese dress. Additionally, Bali had a large part of Lombok under its control for many years, and Balinese keris made in Lombok are virtually impossible to differentiate from Balinese keris made in Bali, keris used in Balinese dress but not made by a Balinese mpu can sometimes be identified, or rather given the probability of having been made in Lombok.

[Gustav]

Yes, I also thought - East Java/Madura.

Unusual in that Madura context for me actually is the Pamor - from what I see from Madura it normally is coarse, broad thick layers, somewhat wild even if well controlled. This one is really minuscule work.

Also Kanyut seems a bit long, but this is likely an older blade.

[A. G. Maisey]

In every keris classification there are variations from maker to maker & from period to period within the life of the same maker, and over a period of time that covers the entire classification, in addition, we do not seek 100% compliance, we seek a dominant presence. It is perhaps taking a note of everything & deciding if a single piece fits within the total population, to do this one must have a lot of background experience.

[Gustav]

Alan, the question then - in which time period in classification Madura could such Pamor have been made?

Something similar regarding finesse I have seen only on Madura Sepuh, with complex Lawe Satukel.

[A. G. Maisey]

Gustav, that question cannot be given an answer that can be supported with any of the banks of knowledge or belief that form a part of the Central Javanese world of the keris.

In fact, it is not really possible with any keris from anywhere to provide an opinion on age based only upon the pamor element in a blade.

The main source of pamor material for Jawa/Bali, was Luwu, and material from Luwu was a trade commodity from about the 14th century.

The foundation of all pattern welding, not only in SE Asia, but in other places across the world, was the necessity to remove impurities from iron before it could be turned into material that was adequate for use in weapons and some tools.

One of the earliest techniques used in this purification process was to begin with a stack of irons, forge weld it & then run it through a process of twisting & welding until the material demonstrated evidence that it was clean enough for purpose. This twisting & welding produced patterns which over time were developed into an art & became proof of quality for the buyer.

The early examples of this were the Merovingian blades, but they used relatively thicker material & fewer bars than the later Viking examples, this was 5th -8th century in what is now France, Germany, Belgium.

This same process of welding & twisting for reasons of material integrity occurred later in Jawa, and for the same reasons, & with a similar result. Over time the various patterns produced by the process developed into an art, the patterns became entrenched as motifs, the motifs gained talismanic intent & belief.

The "twisted bar" type patterns were one of the earliest that smiths developed for producing clean material, & in all honesty a twisted bar pattern is not at all difficult to produce, provided the forge techniques are understood.

So, we might find a twisted bar motif in a very early piece of work, but when the manipulation of the twisted bar has been carried out to produce a particular complex pattern, well, then we are very probably looking at a much later piece of work.

In Jawa these complex pattern welded motifs appeared to begin to be produced when Javanese smiths began to use improved forge technology imported from the Indian sub-continent & notably from Europe.

But it is not just a matter of the overall progression of technology & technique. It takes time for any smith to become a master of his trade, so the early work of any smith might be simple random patterns, but his later work might be master works of the art.

My own early efforts in forge work & pattern welding followed exactly this progression, & I have seen the same course of development with other modern day smiths. I began to learn forge work in the late 1970's, I had stopped intensive work before 1998, the only reason I began to do forge work was to understand better the process of production used in a keris blade. I still do some forge work, & I have taught basic processes to a number of other people, but I never undertook forge work to produce income, it was only ever for the purpose of education.

As we all know, keris blades do not carry the name of the maker, nor the date of manufacture.

A blade made 500 years ago can look as if it has come from the work bench yesterday, if it has had a protected life.

A blade made last week can look as if it is several hundred years old if it has intentionally been made to look so.

To attempt to place a keris blade into a period of time based only upon the type & character of the pamor is totally impossible.

To use the tangguh system to date a blade is perhaps not quite so impossible, but the very name of this system, ie, "tangguh" tells us exactly what the nature of a tangguh classification is:- it is an opinion, and as with any opinion, it is only as good as the knowledge & experience of the person who provides that opinion.

I apologise for this long winded preamble, but I do believe it was probably necessary, not because you, Gustav, do not already have this understanding, but because many people who might read our comments here might not have a similar understanding.

Gustav, to address your question:-

"--- in which time period in classification Madura could such Pamor have been made?"

I cannot give you a supportable answer, & in my opinion, nor can anybody else.

There are several blades shown in this thread, based upon what I believe I can see in the photos, my guesses for two of them, --- post 1 & post 18 --- are 19th century, ie Madura sepuh, the one in post 7 we know to be pre-1674.

[Gustav]

Alan, I asked specifically about Pamor because the execution of it is not very typical for Madura, as I mentioned above, and also the configuration of patterns is not something one sees three times a day. So there is a possibility one has encountered a related blade, especially if he has an experience going long back, and is able to draw conclusions, which possibly allow a more secure placement in a certain time period.

Regarding twisting&welding, probably the first people in Europe who did it, were the celts, already BC, possibly already around 300 BC. At latest around 200 CE Romans could do quite complex pattern welding. There is a possibility it all started in South-East-Europe or Middle East, together with longer swords, which displayed such twisting&welding.

The revival started in the 16th cent. somewhere in Middle East, the earliest known dated yataghan with twisted pattern is from end of 16th cent., around 1600 twisted pattern reached China, and, at the same time or shortly after, what today is Indonesia.