Gunong?

[tom hyle]

I'm not sure; why do you suspect a decorator piece? How thick/solid is the blade? The Visayan MOP I've seen with those jagged edges is wwII or later. The sheath appears to have been carved for a long central (rattan?) wrap, now missing, and the wires are likely to be a later addition, but I wouldn't jump to thinking a "Western"/foreign one. It's not from Luzon, of course, but that's where I've most recently seen a sheath bound like this with industrial wire from. It may well be Moro, and I haven't anything solid against; it's mainly the sheath; it's unusual for a gunong, but may be like some seen on Moro kris sundang. I do think it's important that gunong is not a strictly Moro weapon; I've seen some pretty definitely Lumad ones, and currently own one that is pretty definitely old and more northern PI (Visayan? accessible pictures do exist; ask where if you're interested; there's a bad "shot" or two I took of it on a thread that's either early on this forum or late on the old one, called something like "mysteries, projects, etc."); I doubt they'd call it a gunong that far into the Spanish Empire, as it were, but that wouldn't make it not be a gunong......