Today's Keris find with a ridged blade

[Pendita65]

Today's find a Keris Lurus with a Warangka Iras of Amboina wood. A Surakarta style Ukiran and the blade has geger sapi (ada-ada)
For the rest I don't know have to check the books or learn from the experts here.
So let me know what you think.

Regards, Martin.

[A. G. Maisey]

Very nice item.

This would have been a pretty pricey bit of gear when it was first put together.

Classic.

[Pendita65]

Hi Mr. Maisey,

I thought so too, the guy I bought it from said that this Keris was nothing special, very plain and simple. I told him that I still wanted to see it and when out of the box I could see immediate that it was an Amboina and Iras Warangka. And when I pulled the Keris out I was attracted to the ridged blade and instinctly felt it is special without knowing more. So had to take it home.

Regards, Martin

[A. G. Maisey]

From what I believe I can see in the photos, this looks like a class piece of goods. It does need a fair bit of attention, both blade & dress, but it seems to be one of the nicest keris I've seen in a long time.

[David]

Nice. I would love to see you give it some attention to the wood and blade.

[Pendita65]

Mr. Maisey and David,

thank you both, and yes it will get some TLC this friday starts the summer holiday so there must be some time for me in the six weeks to come.

I will put some pics by then,

Regards, Martin

[Rick]

Alan, how would you go about refinishing the dress?

[A. G. Maisey]

Love that question Rick:- little question that in this case needs a big answer --- that I guess most people will not read anyway.

Firstly, I like this keris. I have a similar one that was in 1000 times worse condition than this when it was given to me by the lady who owned the warung in Pasar Triwindu, Solo, where I was buying at that time, it was in her rubbish basket. It is now one of my “never for sale” keris.

The answer begins by making a decision on what we want to achieve, do we want just a light cosmetic job, or do we want a total restoration? Because I like this keris, I’d give it a total restoration. This is an approach that the vast bulk of collectors who are outside Javanese society do not subscribe to, nor do dealers, for the simple reason that a complete restoration is not a good approach to maximise profit. Nearly everybody goes with the cosmetic approach.

First thing is to remove the pendok & blade & just see what we have to work with. Assuming that the parts of the gandar that are presently hidden by the pendok have no significant damage, the first thing I’d do would be to clean out the inside of the scabbard, all of it.

For this I’d use a 22calibre rifle cleaning rod with a steel brush --- or brass if you cannot find steel --- followed by a bristle brush, blow out the excess dust, I use a small diameter brass tube with a compressed end for this, compressed because I blow through it and compressing the end of the tube increases the force of the blown air.

After all the easily removed gunk was out of the way I would lightly cut out the inside of the gandar with a segrek --- special sort of reverse cutting m’ranggi tool --- and the gambar (top cross piece of the scabbard) with another special little curved knife with a short, maybe 1”, blade on a long thin handle. Brush clean, blow clean. When I was happy that the inside of the scabbard was clean I’d begin on the outside.

The parts of the gandar that presently cannot be seen are probably dirty & dusty & maybe have gunk sticking to the wood, get it all off, scrape, cut, sand do whatever needs to be done to clean that wood off perfectly, but without actually removing any of the wood, just the dirt.

Then clean the pendok, vinegar bath, steel wool, thorough rinse & dry.

That pendok is currently a poor fit. Maybe it can just be pressed into shape to a bit to fit better, maybe not. If not I’ve got 50 or 60 old pendoks exactly like this one, & I’d try to find one that fits better --- OK, yeah, I can do this because I’ve got a lot of old keris parts & materials , others cannot, so then we go to the other solution:- cut pieces of wood from the back of the gandar, fit closely to the sides of the visible strip of gandar running down its front, glue into place with tinted Araldite. Let the adhesive thoroughly cure before doing any more on the scabbard. I like to leave a week to cure, this is more than really necessary, but cure times vary with temperature, so I play safe.
Then I would refit the pendok so that there were no gaps between wood and metal.

Now the scabbard itself can be stripped of the old finish, probably medium steel wool (00) & methylated spirits will do this, light sand & polish, fill imperfections if necessary. If the metho doesn’t work, just carefully sand back. The visible split/gap/checking or whatever it is in the front towards the tip needs to be filled, what to use would need to be decided & might need doing a couple of times before I was satisfied with the result & material to use. However, that said, the most satisfactory job would probably be achieved with 5 minute Araldite tinted with burnt umber & dulled off with 1200 paper or 0000 steel wool.

Then the finish would need to be decided. I cannot give a solid recommendation on this from a photo, I’d need to be working with it, but I think I’d probably go with a fine polish followed by burnish with bone, or ivory --- I use a boars tusk --- then a beeswax finish. I have used other waxes, including microcrystalline, but I’ve come back to bees wax. I might use a gunstock finish like True Oil, or I might use Danish oil, or I might use the french polish approach, but for this wood I think that polish, burnish, bees wax would probably be the most satisfactory. I’d use the burnish for wax, but the other finishes I’ve mentioned do not need the burnish, you do the dry finishing that is appropriate to the wet material used.

After this finishing I’d likely let the scabbard sit for a few weeks before doing anything more, the final fitting of the pendok would finish the job. If the pendok needed to be packed out a little bit, strips of paper in the back of it are all that is needed.

In respect of the hilt, I doubt that I’d do much at all, just give it a really good brushing with a toothbrush, use toothpicks to clean out the carving if necessary, couple of spots of furniture oil on my hands and give it a good hand rub several times over several days, then brush and soft cloth polish. The mendak I’d give a vinegar soak, brush, rinse, if not too badly damaged I’d refit, if badly damaged I’d replace with another old mendak --- not easy to get for most people, but I have a lot of all qualities. If I needed to fit a replacement mendak I would not go over the top, it would be middle quality.

That would finish the work on the dress, but the dress is not nearly as important as the blade. The blade needs the edges to be dressed for their complete length, gently blending the undamaged length into the heavily corroded length, in this process we remove as little metal as possible, & we are tolerant of minor nicks & imperfections, when the edges are straight we cut a new cutting edge with files & stones, the edge taper is kept narrow, just a couple of millimeters is enough. Then the blade is cleaned to white & stained.

The hilt is refitted using knitting wool as the tang binding, the blade is oiled and placed into a plastic sleeve, replaced into the scabbard, placed into a singep (cloth bag), and stored laying down in a dark, protected place. If a keris is restored & stored like this, we can usually come back to it in 50 years time & it will still look new.

If we really need to place it on display, support it properly standing or hanging upright, and attend to cleaning & dusting every ten days or so.

NB --- in the process of finishing the wood, we can be tolerant of minor dents & imperfections, there is no real need to fill every tiny imperfection.

[Pendita65]

Hi Mr, Maisey,

thank you so much for your very detailed idea on how to restore this Keris, I understand the thought of improving the wilah so that the imperfections of time and neglect are less striking. I believe all of this, but as a trained furniture restorer i was trained to keep as much of the original as possible, and one rule was don't do irreversible interventions. So yes that is a tough one for me, But from the view of you and also from the tradition of Keris culture it is more nurishing the Keris, show it the respect and care that a true pusaka would get in Indonesia.
I will first see if i can bend the pendok a bit more so the fit would become better. I also have some other pendoks in my attic that i once bought at an auction and maybe one of them fits even better. I will make a picture of the scabbard from the back as there is a small piece missing but i don't know if it was allready there after the making of the scabbard or that it was created after.

But all in all i love to read your thoughts about this one, and they sure give me more insight into proper restoration or at least different possibillities of restoring Keris.

Thank you so much and regards,

Martin

[Pendita65]

The damage on the back of the scabbard

[Pendita65]

Second try to attach the photo

[A. G. Maisey]

This sort of damage is very common Martin, its no big deal. From the photo, it appears that you would have very little difficulty in obtaining wood should you need it.

I agree that it is probably a very bad idea to do "irreversible interventions" & nothing I have written falls within what I understand as an irreversible intervention. I also have a background working with wood. My father was a fine art cabinet maker, & there were cabinet makers stretching back through his family for many generations. He taught me a lot, I was doing minor repairs and french polishing before I finished primary school, ie, before age 12. In fact, I learnt so much from my father that I decided that there were easier & more rewarding ways to earn a living than to work with wood, but my early learning has stood me in good stead during my entire life.

Combine this with what I have learnt in Jawa about the culturally correct way in which to relate to the keris, & there you have my foundations.

In Jawa, keris dress is not valued in anything like the way it is valued by collectors who are outside Javanese culture & society, as it was put to me by more than one person, the hilt & wrongko of a keris are like the clothes of a man: they should be changed when necessary, but the keris itself must be preserved.So, if you were Javanese & you took a liking to this keris, you would very likely not have the scabbard repaired at all, you would give the keris to a m'ranggi to bring the blade back to life & to make at least a new wrongko for it.

But you are not Javanese & you do not have the ability to turn this keris over to a m'ranggi to bring it back, so you need to do the best you can with what you have. I have attempted to provide a very basic guide in respect of how you might be able to do that.

This keris is a Javanese cultural artefact, & the Javanese own their own culture, if we respect the mores of that culture we should act according to those mores, not adopt an attitude where we place the mores of our own culture & society above those of Javanese culture & society.