A Very Old Kris

[migueldiaz]

Originally Posted by David

In Javanese terms the "gandik" is not the "elephant trunk". That would be the "kembang kacang" in the diagrams you posted above. While this feature seems to be present in all Moro kris it is not a necessary feature on the Indonesian keris, but the gandik is.
As for this so-called "elephant trunk" feature on Moro kris, my feeling about it's intention is that sometimes it is supposed to be an elephant, sometimes a bird and sometimes even a naga. I have examples that clearly show all three of these forms. Just as it's Indonesian cousin comes in a variety of animal motifs (elephant, naga, singo, etc.) in the kembang kacang, so i believe does the Moro kris.

David, thanks for the comments. As for Moro swords, I agree that the 'elephant trunk' can represent both naga and bird. I'm not too sure though that in the Moro context, it can also mean an elephant. And it's because historically, there were no elephants in the our islands.

We used to have stegodons in the distant past (based on fossils found). But no elephants then, and now. Well, actually there used to a few (imported) elephants in Sulu, after the ruler of Java in 1395 gifted the Sultan of Sulu with Javanese elephants. This is according to Saleeby (1908), based on written accounts of the Moros (the tarsilah). More on this story can be found here.

On a related matter, Alcina in his 1668 epic work on the history of the Visayas included the elephant as part of the region's fauna. So maybe they also came from Sulu.

So on second thoughts, perhaps the elephant is after all a possible interpretation also of the 'elephant trunk'.

But I think the more important thing we can glean from the above story is that Java and Sulu, and Java and Manila (900 AD, per the LCI), have been corresponding with each other for the longest time.

And for Java to gift Sulu something means that Sulu must have enjoyed some prominence even in those earlier times.

So I think I'll just end this rambling by saying that presumably, the sword designs of each region (Java, Brunei, Sulu, Manila, Cebu, etc.) must have somehow influenced each other, given the close ties among them.

[migueldiaz]

ron, your question on the tang shape kept me thinking all day long.

and so i spent the whole morning (wed.) reviewing those ancient gold hilts at the two museums here in manila. and then i have to dig up hutterer's findings on those cebu daggers that's about a thousand years older.

and here i am still pounding away at the keyboard at 1:00 am the following day. therefore, you owe me a drink of sarsi and a lot of popcorn!

so let's start with the oldest one -- figure 2b according to hutterer is 'early iron age'. iron age in the country is between 500 bc to 900 ad. thus let's say '2b' is 500 to 100 bc. as we can see, the tang appears to be cylindrical.

fast forward to about a thousand years later -- figure 2a per hutterer also, is from "the first millennium a.d. ... [up to the] late 9th century to early 10th century a.d.". and what i think i see is a hexagonal tang. and the hexagonal cross-section appears to carry through, up to the beginning of the blade's forte. these scientific illustrations are pretty accurate. thus i think the hexagon we are seeing is real.

next up are the 10th to 13th century gold hilts ...

[migueldiaz]

these gold hilts i'll show are all from the 10th to 13th century a.d. and these gold hilts constitute the 'universe', meaning there's no other 10th to 13th c. gold hilts that can found (except those in private collection, but i suppose they are fewer).

the first one exhibits a rectangular hole in the hilt, hence a rectangular tang.

[migueldiaz]

the 2nd hilt's tang opening can't be seen from the way it's displayed at the museum. i think next time i'll bring a mirror and a flashlight, to get that angle where we can see what we need to see.

[migueldiaz]

next up are these two 'hilts', in which one has a circular hole for the tang, while the other has a rectangular hole where the tang passes.

i put quote marks on the word hilt above, because i have doubts whether these are hilts at all. but for the time being, let's go by what the museum says.

[migueldiaz]

now this is a real nice gold hilt. and the tang hole is clearly a square.

[migueldiaz]

the tang hole in this one is unique -- it's triangular!