A Bugis keris for comments

DAHenkel · 14th March 2005, 01:58 PM

Alamak! Rahman, tapak kuda lah...mana ada kaki kuda punya hulu sih?

I'd say that piece has the most recent goldwork though. It lacks the finess of some ofthe earlier work. I'm going to have to disagree with Blu on the goldwork of Rsword's piece though. I'm thinking more mid-19th c. By 1900 most of the Sultan's were under Colonial domination, there was a precipitous decline in the quality of - especially - high end keris and the Raja Raja went off and became good little Westernized puppets, spending thier money on motorcars, waterford crystal and Gordon's gin.

There's a similar example in Jensen - attributed to an Acehnese prince but clearly Straits in origin - I can't remember if its dated and I don't have a copy of the book so maybe someone can look it up - if I'm not wrong it was mid-19th. RSword's other piece also strikes me as S. Sumatran Bugis in origin. The blade especially. The dress is about as generically "Bugis" as you could get. Someday I'm going to get off my butt and take a trip down through Siak, Indragiri and Palembang. Have a sniff around and see what turns up. But for the time being I'd say this style is safely S. Sumatran.

Actually telling these things apart isn't really all that hard most of the time - there are some wierd ones that turn up but for the most part its pretty straightforward. Hard and fast rules though, will usually get you in trouble. I'm not going to go through a lot of trouble to write out all of the defining characteristics either - that's a hell of a lot of work and I was kinda' saving it for a book

but really the best way is the tried and true rule, the more you handle, the more you know.

You should all keep in mind that in the mid-1700's there were over 40,000 "Bugis" living in Riau. By the 1860's their descendants had become "Melayu keturunan Bugis", that is "Malay's of Bugis descent." In other words for all intents and purposes - at least for 19th c and later pieces, which is most of them - all of these keris are "Malay" keris anyway.

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14th March 2005, 01:58 PM	#31
DAHenkel Member Join Date: Dec 2004 Posts: 125	Alamak! Rahman, tapak kuda lah...mana ada kaki kuda punya hulu sih? I'd say that piece has the most recent goldwork though. It lacks the finess of some ofthe earlier work. I'm going to have to disagree with Blu on the goldwork of Rsword's piece though. I'm thinking more mid-19th c. By 1900 most of the Sultan's were under Colonial domination, there was a precipitous decline in the quality of - especially - high end keris and the Raja Raja went off and became good little Westernized puppets, spending thier money on motorcars, waterford crystal and Gordon's gin. There's a similar example in Jensen - attributed to an Acehnese prince but clearly Straits in origin - I can't remember if its dated and I don't have a copy of the book so maybe someone can look it up - if I'm not wrong it was mid-19th. RSword's other piece also strikes me as S. Sumatran Bugis in origin. The blade especially. The dress is about as generically "Bugis" as you could get. Someday I'm going to get off my butt and take a trip down through Siak, Indragiri and Palembang. Have a sniff around and see what turns up. But for the time being I'd say this style is safely S. Sumatran. Actually telling these things apart isn't really all that hard most of the time - there are some wierd ones that turn up but for the most part its pretty straightforward. Hard and fast rules though, will usually get you in trouble. I'm not going to go through a lot of trouble to write out all of the defining characteristics either - that's a hell of a lot of work and I was kinda' saving it for a book but really the best way is the tried and true rule, the more you handle, the more you know. You should all keep in mind that in the mid-1700's there were over 40,000 "Bugis" living in Riau. By the 1860's their descendants had become "Melayu keturunan Bugis", that is "Malay's of Bugis descent." In other words for all intents and purposes - at least for 19th c and later pieces, which is most of them - all of these keris are "Malay" keris anyway.