genuine of fake?

[A. G. Maisey]

Tim, I was not writing of myself, but a very famous fellow who is now a Javanese Prince and has been a directive force in Indonesian society since the days of Sukarno. A very, very important, knowledgeable and influential man. Not a nonentity like myself.

But yes, I have made errors. These days, very, very few, in fact, I cannot recall any recent material errors at all, but going back 40 years and more I made quite a few. In light of my knowledge at that time, none were avoidable, I only had experience in the keris in the Australian environment until I was well into my twenties,and this was not enough back prior to the increased flow of information generated by the internet and all the new publications.

I have always thought of these errors, and the costs involved in learning about the keris, as education expenses. How much does a degree cost ? How much does it cost to put a kid through primary school? All education costs money. You pay the tuition costs and move on. If I add up what it has cost me to learn about keris, I could probably have paid for several post graduate degrees. At least.

But the bottom line is that I can still make a mistake.

This realisation is probably the most important single thing I have learnt.