Keris - javanese blade in Kedah mounts?

[Gustav]

Kai, Alan, thank you for your answers. This Keris is not mine, it's depicted in both Jensens book and Krisdisk (chapter 10, page 32). Length of the blade 36,6 cm. Unfortunately no better pictures of Grenend there.

[A. G. Maisey]

Thanks Gustav. Yes, I see what you mean.

[T. Koch]

Detlef, thank you for the picture. I'm duly aware that the interstitial zone of hippo tusks sometimes produce dark inclusions along the lateral margins, but similar "spots in a row" can be found in other types of ivory: The inner cementum of walrus or longitudinally along deep age cracks in tusks of the proboscids, for example. I was just hoping that maybe you had an academic reference up your sleeve to tie them to the hippo.

In general I think one should exercise care in assigning a source species to any ivory based on one character alone. -this goes x10 when we're doing it from photographs of course. I can recommend the article "Unusual appearance of Schreger-like pattern in Hippopotamus amphibius ivory" (Simms, 2010). -I don't agree with their conclusions, but their findings illustrate this point very well.


Best wishes, - Thor

[kai]

Hello Thor,

I'm duly aware that the interstitial zone of hippo tusks sometimes produce dark inclusions along the lateral margins, but similar "spots in a row" can be found in other types of ivory: The inner cementum of walrus or longitudinally along deep age cracks in tusks of the proboscids, for example.

Do you have any pics of such examples? The mottled areas of walrus make it usually less difficult to spot if the pieces are of reasonable size; while I have also seen spots with elephant, these seemed much less regularly distributed compared to hippo.

I was just hoping that maybe you had an academic reference up your sleeve to tie them to the hippo.

Thanks for the reminder - still need to search my wide sleeves...

In general I think one should exercise care in assigning a source species to any ivory based on one character alone. -this goes x10 when we're doing it from photographs of course.

D'accord.

I can recommend the article "Unusual appearance of Schreger-like pattern in Hippopotamus amphibius ivory" (Simms, 2010). -I don't agree with their conclusions, but their findings illustrate this point very well.

Here's the link !

Regards,
Kai

[Jean]

From the pictures I feel quite convinced that this hilt is made from hippo ivory as said by Detlef for the following reasons (not supported by any academic research but only practical experience):
. The dotted line is very characteristic of the hippo ivory and different from the age cracks of elephant ivory.
. Walrus ivory has a marble appearance if observed in cross view and this should reflect on the external visual appearance of the hilt, which is not the case.
. I have some doubts that walrus ivory was widely used for making kris hilts because it would involve trading links with Russia while it is widely accepted that the Bugis traded hippo and elephant ivory with East Africa, either directly or with the Omanis who controlled the area.
I refer you to the well-documented book from Wolfgang Schilling: "Faszination kris - Zauber des Materials" about the subject.
By the way I never observed any Schreger/ Retzius line in a piece supposedly made from hippo ivory...
Of course I remain open to discussion and am ready to change my mind if anybody can convince me otherwise
Best regards

[Sajen]

Hello Thor,

sorry for my late reply. I also don't have any academic research/opinon for my point of view. My position is based on facts like explained from Jean. I also refer you to the book from Wolfgang Schilling who is a friend collector from me. Sadly it will be difficult to get the book, the edition was very small.
A 100% safe result will be possible only by DNA anlysis IMHO.

Regards,

Detlef

[Jean]

Attached are the pictures of a similar hilt also made from hippo ivory I think, please note that the crest and "nose" have been damaged. The piece from Gustav may have been dyed as normally hippo ivory stays very white even after a long time (I saw few exceptions though).
Regards