Collection of Sajen

[Kulino]

Dear all,

Lately I’ve become custodian of a substantial number of keris sajen, jimat and kudi.
What to do with this collection without breaking it up is a valid question. Museums won’t be interested in a collection, maybe in the odd one. Repatriating is not a real option for obvious reasons.
There seems to be a rapidly shifting interest, from antiques in general and keris more specific to, maybe modern art? The number of baby boom collectors is decreasing; substantial collections are being sold off, raising very little interest. I’ve had this discussion with friends. A keris or any other collector item has a monetary value but more importantly, also a cultural value. What is left of that if there is no one to share this with? Can we remedy this in any way, apart from sharing our interests on this forum ? ( Maybe not in the first place to protect the monetary value although to some of use that might be a concern as well. )
I would like to start a discussion about this problem which may concern more of us. For all good purposes, this collection is not for sale.

Next I would like to share the keris part of this collection with you. At least if there is enough interest in it. This is to open it up for study purposes, but also to charm you by these intriguing keris. This collection of about 86 sajen has never been published or shown in any way to other collectors. It was collected over the last 50 to 60 years here in the Netherlands and on Java. There are old ones and recent ones. Some were added to the collection to serve as study material to compare old and new. Genuine or different, I leave that to your esteemed judgement. Mr.Theo Alkema nor members of any keris study club have ever seen this collection. The collection resides in the Netherlands. As long as there is enough interest I will keep on posting. If there are collectors out there who are interested in the jimat and kudi (about 60), I will start a new string on the other forum. Please ask me to do so.
To any person who really is studying this type of keris; I will consider questions about taking additional pictures of details. However, since I still have a regular job, you have to grant me time to accommodate.
Best,
Kulino

[David]

Thanks for starting this off with a couple of examples from this collection.
I am not sure what the over all interest will be, but i do know that there are a few members like myself and Alan Maisey who have a great interest in these, though admittedly i cannot say that i have much great knowledge on them beyond reading Theo's book and intermittent discussions on this forum.
I cannot tell for sure, but does that first example also display picit elements (finger impressions along the blade)?
You might want you look though our archives on discussions we have previously had on keris sajen. Here is one link, but you will find others, both under "keris sajen" and the misnomered tag "keris majapahit".
http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showth...ighlight=putut

[Kulino]

Dear David,
Thanks for the link. I came across it earlier. BTW, both keris have picit.
I've added the next set of two keris.
I have to appologise for the somewhat unsharp close up pictures. Again if that is a problem and some one would like to have better images to study, I'll see to it. For now I'll leave it to it.

[Sajen]

Originally Posted by Kulino

Next I would like to share the keris part of this collection with you. At least if there is enough interest in it. The collection resides in the Netherlands. As long as there is enough interest I will keep on posting.

Hello Kulino,

I for my part are very interested to see the complete collection, I like this small keris sajen very much and have byself a small collection of them, see the link David has posted. Thank you very much for sharing.

Regards,
Detlef

[Rick]

Please do keep going.

[kai]

Hello Kulino,

I'm with the others and applaud to your efforts to share the whole collection with us! I'd also be very interested in the jimat and kudi - it's rare to see good examples of these, too!

Could you possibly tell us more on the background of the original collector? It does seem that he was especially into the metaphysical side of things?


Regarding discussing the fate of "our" collections that we're currently taking care of, maybe this would be good to discuss in this dedicated thread here:
http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showthread.php?t=22474

While discussing the pieces on this forum allows for additional info and welcome interaction, it may also be an option to put up a dedicated website presenting and virtually preserving the full collection in a somewhat more structured approach. This has already been done for our late long-time forumite Lew:
http://www.vikingsword.com/lew/index.html

Regards,
Kai

[Kulino]

Dear Detlef,
Thanks for the links. The one about what to do next, is focussing on selling it , which is an alternative. When my friend and I talked about what to do with it, his preference clearly was to keep it together. That would be my first goal. We also talked about how to promote interest. Our idea is that in order to raise this, you have to able to fall in love with quality pieces. This seems to be contradictive to the keeping together idea.

[Kulino]

Next batch

[Sajen]

Originally Posted by kai

Regards,
Detlef

Hello Kai,

do you have changed your name because you like my one more?

Best,
Detlef

[Kulino]

Saw that too, got a bit confused. I gather Kai send me the reply with the links and not Detlef? Sorry for my misnaming.

[Jean]

Hello Kulino,
Thank you for posting the pics of these nice and rare pieces with different designs. Has anybody an opinion about the estimated age of these pieces, personally I am totally confused about it although it may not be considered as important.
Regards

[Kulino]

Hello Jean,
As far as I understand, although these keris are named and dated as keris Majapahit, this must be considered a misconception. Indeed the one found inside one of the stupa op Borobudur (now in the collection of Theo Alkema) might be an indication of when they were made. However, there is no reason why they couldn't have been made earlier or later. Among others, Theo Alkema ( Book: Iron Ancestors) and Martin Kerner (A statistic study on the morphology of keris) come to the same conclusion: There is no certain way of telling how old they might be. When I was at Martin Kerner's home I handled a proto keris ( as depicted on candi Suku). It was dug up from the slopes of the inside Bromo krater. He had this specimen carbon dated. The conclusion was (within a certain time frame), around 800 ad.
The Knaud keris has not been subjected to this kind of testing, there is only a year indication. Apart from these more or less subjective indications, there is no certainty.
When my friend collector and I discussed this, we tried to be open minded and be guided by what we saw’. By looking at the individual keris and by comparing among others, skin, material, wear, weight, figurine posture, tilt, squat, head attire, face, body decorations, one might conclude that one keris is part of a group and the one group could be older than the other. The wear could be a problem. Has this keris, tosan aji, been dug up, been taken care of properly, placed in the stream of a sawa, revered as pusaka? The same approach can be used when looking at the Jimat and Kudi published on the other forum. As indicated earlier, there has already been an extensive discussion and a link to Alan Maisey’s site with lots of information. http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showt...highlight=putut

[Kulino]

Next batch.

[Kulino]

Box 2 overview

[kai]

Hello Detlef,

do you have changed your name because you like my one more?

Possibly, or it might have been a Freudian slip since a keris sajen that had already my name on it found its way to you by accident...

Regards,
Kai "a rose by any other name..."

[Sajen]

Originally Posted by kai

Hello Detlef,


Possibly, or it might have been a Freudian slip since a keris sajen that had already my name on it found its way to you by accident...

Regards,
Kai "a rose by any other name..."

[Kulino]

BTW Box 1 contains Jimat, so Sajen started with box 2.
For the sake of speed, I'll limit the amout of pictures of each keris to1, instead of three.

[Kulino]

Second part of box 3

[Kulino]

Third part of box 3. Plus overview

[Kulino]

Box 4.1. Pretty sure there some and not old copies in this part.

[Kulino]

Next part

[Kulino]

Last part of this box

[Jean]

Hello Kulino,
Museum collection, congratulations! Your pics are clear but you should try to minimize the light reflection on the individual pics in order to better see the blades surface (pamor pattern, picit, hilt face, etc) The group pics are basically OK.
Regards

[Kulino]

Thank you Jean, I'll take your advise under consideration when additional pictures are asked. For now, all these pictures were taken by using an IPhone and by putting the boxes on the table top in the garden. No studio circumstances indeed.

[Kulino]

Dear all,
I'm stopping the posting, since I'm the only one still visiting this string.
Should there be a (re)new(ed) interest I will consider continuation.

[Bob A]

Lack of posting does not necessarily mean lack of interest.

An assemblage of such items is useful in several ways. It serves as a reference source, delineates variation within types as well as depicting the varying types themselves, stimulates interest in those who have little or no exposure to the objects in question, for just a few examples of utility.

While I have none of these items, I found it of interest to view your collection, and I'm grateful for your efforts.

[David]

Originally Posted by Bob A

Lack of posting does not necessarily mean lack of interest.

An assemblage of such items is useful in several ways. It serves as a reference source, delineates variation within types as well as depicting the varying types themselves, stimulates interest in those who have little or no exposure to the objects in question, for just a few examples of utility.

While I have none of these items, I found it of interest to view your collection, and I'm grateful for your efforts.

I will second everything that Bob has stated here.
People will visit more as you add more. I think most collectors don't actually know enough about this form of keris to have much top comment on at the moment. As you have stated, knowing or understanding the approximate age and purpose of each of these keris sajen is difficult at best. You have a great variance of style and form present and i am not sure anyone here, with the exception of perhaps Alan Maisey, has researched these well enough to have much of any relevant value to add to the discussion. I am a bit surprised he has not made any comments here yet.
You might also look at this a different way though. By uploading to this site you are creating an archive of images of these lesser known and discussed objects of keris culture in a place that is frequented by a great number of people who are indeed interested in the study of keris. Even if they generate only a small amount of discussion in the moment this archive of images could become a valuable resource for future researchers as well as the current crop of collectors we have with us at this time. I would encourage you to continue the presentation process if you have the will and thank you for your efforts so far.

[Jean]

Hello Kulino,
I am also very interested by this thread and amazed by the diversity of your pieces. You should focus on the number of views rather than the reply posts as most of us have no relevant comment to make, but we are enjoying the pics!
And if you intend to publish a catalogue or book, I am reserving one copy!
Of course if you know anything about the origin of some of these pieces, please tell us!
Regards

[Sajen]

Hello Kulino,

agree with the above made statements! Over 300 views in such short time shows that there is a great interest!

Best regards,
Detlef

[A. G. Maisey]

David, the reason I have not made any comment is because I have no comment to make. There is a page in my site where I have put some photos of these small talismanic keris, but even there I have virtually nothing to say about them.

Here below is most of the text from that page, it says probably everything of any value that I can say about this keris form:-

" These are not weapons in any sense other than being weapons to guard against misfortune, they are not weapons intended to be used against humanity.

In a sense, this could probably be called a "non-information" page. Not enough is known about these items of wesi aji to allow a definitive discourse on them. My purpose in making these photos available is to assist researchers in this field.

The items hereunder that resemble a keris are known as "keris sajen" in Indonesia, and by many collectors in the western world as "keris Majapahit". The keris sajen is reportedly a keris used in offerings, notably the ceremony of bersih desa which is carried out after the major rice harvest (panen raya). Dates for the harvest can vary, and each village has its own day and own requirements for bersih desa, so offerings can change from village to village.

In the ceremonies I have seen, no keris sajen has been used. Suryo Negoro in his book "Javanese Traditional and Ritual Ceremonies" describes the general form of bersih desa and mentions two other forms specific to individual villages. Nowhere does he describe the inclusion of a keris in these ceremonies. Bambang Harsrinuksmo in "Ensiklopedi Keris" claims use of this keris form in the ceremony of bersih desa, and other writers have also claimed this. It is possible that some villages could have the requirement for a keris sajen to be included in the ceremony and other villages not have this requirement.

David van Duuren records that in the colonial days, these small keris were known as talismanic weapons.

My own observance has been that present day Javanese regard them as talismanic objects.

At the present time insufficient research has been carried out in relation to this form of wesi aji to allow any certain definition of their place in Indonesian or Javanese culture.

In respect of the age of keris sajen in general, and this is also true of the examples shown here , it is not possible to be at all certain of how old any particular item may be. The form is clearly an ancient one, and an example was found under the central stupa of Candi Borobudur during its restoration, however, whether it was placed there at the time Borobudur was built, or at a later date, we do not know. However, although ancient, it is doubtful if the form can be linked to Dongson daggers with similar handles. The time gap between Dongson culture and early classical Javanese culture is too great.

Some writers have attempted to classify this form of wesi aji into types and sub-types, and wish to make true weapons of the longer examples of the keris sajen. I do not intend to attempt any such classification. Too little is known of these objects for such a classification to be of very much use. The design of the gonjo of the longer examples would seem to indicate that these were not intended for use as a real weapon, any more than was the shorter version. Anybody using one of these long examples as a weapon would be likely to do severe injury to their own hand, because of the narrowness of the gonjo.

I think it is highly probable that the alternate keris sajen as in #'s 15, 17, 18, 19, 20, were forged from recycled old keris blades. Further, I believe that recycled old keris blades were sometimes used in the manufacture of certain other talismanic keris, those with the handle forge welded to the base of the blade. Whether this was done simply as a use of recycled material, whether to preserve a valued blade, whether to save costs, or for all these reasons, we have no way of knowing.

Apart from those items of wesi aji that are positively identifiable as keris sajen, a number of other items of talismanic wesi aji are also shown here. Some are keris-like, with the handle in a different plane to the blade, one is of cunderik form.

I regret that I am unable to provide more information on these talismanic objects, however, I am open to questions or discussion in respect of them."

This link will take you to photos of keris sajen in my site:-

http://www.kerisattosanaji.com/kerissajen.html