Need advice on this keris I got from eBay

[A. G. Maisey]

I once asked a very good friend of mine who was Javanese and a devout Muslim if he could explain Lam Alif to me. He told me that to even get a beginning of understanding I would need to spend seven lifetimes in study of Al Quran in order to prepare me for the next seven lifetimes of spiritual practice, only after this might I recognise the way to understanding.

He warned me that anybody who claimed to understand Lam Alif was not to be believed.

Lam Alif is actually two letters that when placed together form a singularity.

My friend was a very spiritual man and enjoyed speaking in ways that nobody could understand.

[Azman]

Thank you Maisey. I did a bid of search on what you said below. Interesting indeed. On one side the pamor looks like a Lam Alif at a base of a large tree trunk. Perharps it’s just my imagination.

[Azman]

One the side with a clrearer Lam Alif and the tree trunk, I can see the pamor seems to be continuous and turns into island shape at the tip of the blade. Whilst on the other side it looks like an Arabic letter Ta as it seems to have like and inverted C with two distinct dots on the open crescent. One think interesting for sure is I could see the flow of the blade uniformly hammered grain boundaries running up to the tip. I thought this is very interesting and almost looks like a dissimilar metals being forged and pressed but I cannot say what they are. Some of the metallurgy looks shiny and some just plane white spot. Interesting point to ponder.

[A. G. Maisey]

The metal is what we call "pamor sanak", the word "sanak" means "related", this metal is a mixture of two or more types of ferric material.

[Azman]

Originally Posted by A. G. Maisey

The metal is what we call "pamor sanak", the word "sanak" means "related", this metal is a mixture of two or more types of ferric material.

Maisey, Thanks again. Any idea on the age of this keris?

[A. G. Maisey]

See Post #13.

Scabbard & hilt could be around the same age, pendok is recent.

[Azman]

This one is longer and it has a beautiful warangka. The blade looks like it’s gorge from steel and has some coating on it. Alimony looks like varnish. Hopefully it’s not some kind of poison like ‘getah damak ‘ which was used those days for poisoning arrow tip and tombak or spear. I was told by the seller that this was from 1900 to 1940 range but who knows. It looks so much sturdy and I think almost like a katana blade. It’s longer too, almost 14.5 inch blade. I can tell it has been forge with layered metal but it has no pamor and the surface is not like a typical keris roughness. It’s much smoother. What is your view in this interesting sundang?

[A. G. Maisey]

Javanese, dhapur brojol, possibly classification (tangguh) Tuban, blade probably before 1900, needs a clean & stain.

This is a keris, it is not a sundang.

Incidentally, "getah damak" in Malay means "blowpipe gum" > "getah" is natural latex, tree gum, a "damak" is the dart used in a blowpipe, by itself this stuff is not poisonous, but to make it poisonous the sap of the ipoh/ipuh tree is added to it.

[Azman]

Thank you Maisey. Wow…never thought that this keris could be this old. I’ll try to clean it.By the way, can you detect any kind of pamor on this keris?