Mr. Maisey, thank you so much again for your incredibly detailed explanations. I can't pretend I can fully comprehend your answer yet, but it gives me more to read up on, which I am grateful for! The layers upon layers of symbolism in these blades are stunning.
I have many more questions, but I need to pace them a bit, have to work on the backlog of things to understand first
Going back from the spiritual side to the object of metal, I followed your advice and removed the wrapping. It seems it has been there quite a while, and there was active rust under it, so I removed this (only with camellia seed oil) as best as I could. For the first time, I could also see the white metal that I have learned to associate with the pamor, quite interesting. Definitely not a cheap fake, I can rule that out from the metallurgy.
What I find fascinating about my keris is that it has a spiritual meaning to (try to) understand, a history to research and a historic meaning and on top of that is a fascinating object artfully crafted from different metals. A kind soul has sent me a lot of pictures of various other Naga Sasra blades from a book I do not have access to... that has led to many more questions, but appreciating the metal side of it while cleaning the pesi has led me to comparatively rather simple questions for today: How many hours would it have taken to make a Keris like that? How long for the forging, then how long for the carving? And would the bladesmith/empu be the one to work in all the gold inlays as well? From the pictures I have seen, my blade probably used to have a lot more gold than it does now, and that is a very interesting topic in itself, but for now I just wonder if the empu would do the gold inlays or if a different craftsman would take over the finished blade.
Thank you for your guidance in understanding and appreciating my Keris better