To keep up the level of terminology it would be preferred if we do not call a parang with a flat blade, as well as when it is coming from NW Borneo, a "mandau".
Why make a blade like this more "puzzling" than it already is by giving it an incorrect (or simplified?) label at a specialized ethnographic forum like this?
Not only the Iban (an externally given name which literary means wanderer/nomad in Kayan language) were migrating, also the blades, hilts and the complete swords migrated all over the region.
When studying the old sources they describe how there was a lot of trading and cross-cultural influences going on between the different tribes in Borneo.
Michael
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