A very, very old Moro kris

[Ian]

David and Detlef,

You are both much more knowledgeable about keris than I am. Thank you for your thoughts. However, neither of you commented on the presence of a round tang versus a flat or squared tang. In other discussions here, the presence of a round tang was thought to indicate an early form of kris. It has been suggested that the move to a flat tang was to avoid the twisting of the hilt in the hand during use, and that the asang asang were applied for the same reason.

Detlef, do you know if your old kris has a round tang or how long the tang is? IIRC, the tang has become shorter over time, and early tangs were often quite long in the hilt.

[Sajen]

Originally Posted by Ian

David and Detlef,

You are both much more knowledgeable about keris than I am. Thank you for your thoughts. However, neither of you commented on the presence of a round tang versus a flat or squared tang. In other discussions here, the presence of a round tang was thought to indicate an early form of kris. It has been suggested that the move to a flat tang was to avoid the twisting of the hilt in the hand during use, and that the asang asang were applied for the same reason.

Detlef, do you know if your old kris has a round tang or how long the tang is? IIRC, the tang has become shorter over time, and early tangs were often quite long in the hilt.

Hi Ian,
Yes, I know that it's said that early blades have a round tang. But frankly I haven't seen enough early blades without handles to verify this, but it seems reasonable. But there is still the question from which time frame there was the change from round to square tangs.

And no, I don't know the tang construction by this one nor by the other old kris blade in my possession, I've never dismantled the handles. Sadly I don't have a veterinarian as friend! For sure it would be helpful to know it by many more examples, we would know much more.

Regards,
Detlef

[Rafngard]

Originally Posted by Ian

Detlef, do you know if your old kris has a round tang or how long the tang is? IIRC, the tang has become shorter over time, and early tangs were often quite long in the hilt.

Depending on the construction of the hilt, the length of the tang might be a lot easier to test than the roundness of the tang. On my example above, a refrigerator magnet will stick to the hilt (thus indicating ferrous material) at any point between the ganja and the ivory pommel.

Also, I'll be seeing local former forum member this weekend, who happens to have an archaic Kris with a round tang. I'll check to see if his Kris has the gap.

Have fun,
Leif

[Ian]

As promised, here are the X-rays of the hilt. The various features visible on the X-ray are shown in the picture below, which was taken mainly to visualize the tang. The tang seems quite long compared with 19th C and more modern kris, tapers slightly from the blade to the end of the tang, and has a slight bend. Also apparent are the thick silver bands spaced along the handle. Looking at the pommel, it is interesting to note a drilled void within it that has been hollowed out to accommodate a peg from the handle which has been fixed to the pommel with a small nail or pin. The pin is visible on the exterior of the hilt and there is a small crack in the wood caused by its presence. The degree of detail in this picture is more than I had expected, although we experimented somewhat to get the desired contrast in the image.
The following table shows how the actual length and width of the tang can be calculated from a print out of the attached picture. Using a vernier micrometer, I measured the actual length of the the silver grip on the sword; this was 8.85 cm. I then measured the length of the same structure on the image; that was 7.85 cm. This meant that all linear dimensions on that X-ray image needed to be corrected by a factor of 8.85/7.85 in order to arrive at the correct linear measurement.

[Ian]

Here are the views obtained with rotation of the long axis of the sword. They show that tang width at various points along the hilt shows slight narrowing with progressive rotation from horizontal (0º) to vertical (90º), but not enough to suggest that this is a flat tang. The flattening is somewhat accentuated by the sword coming off the table as it was rotated, because of the effect of the gangya. Allowing for some parallax by referencing the width of the tang to the width of the cylindrical hilt at the same point, indicated little difference in width of the tang in each projection. This suggests a round tang IMHO.

Images have been rotated for ease of viewing the changes associated with rotation of the sword.

0º rotation (horizontal)



30º rotation



60º rotation



90º rotation (vertical)

[Sajen]

Hi Ian,

Great pictures! But I am not really sure if the tang is indeed round.

Regards,
Detlef

[David]

Originally Posted by Sajen

Hi Ian,

Great pictures! But I am not really sure if the tang is indeed round.

Regards,
Detlef

I agree. There really is only one way to be sure.

[Ian]

David and Detlef,

Geometry tells us that the only cross-section that produces a uniform width when viewed from several angles is a circle (or a circular object with many small facets). I believe the pictures show that this is not a flat tang, nor a square tang.

I would like to put it through a computerized tomography (CT) scanner, but those are expensive pieces of equipment found only in hospitals and radiology clinics and are not readily accessible. A CT scan would definitively answer if the tang was round in cross-section.

[Rafngard]

Originally Posted by Rafngard

Depending on the construction of the hilt, the length of the tang might be a lot easier to test than the roundness of the tang. On my example above, a refrigerator magnet will stick to the hilt (thus indicating ferrous material) at any point between the ganja and the ivory pommel.

Also, I'll be seeing local former forum member this weekend, who happens to have an archaic Kris with a round tang. I'll check to see if his Kris has the gap.

Have fun,
Leif

Took me longer than expected to get them, but here's pics of Federico's round-tanged kris.
It does in fact have the gap.

[Ian]

Leif, thank you so much for those pictures. There is a lot of similarity with the example I posted at the top of this thread. Again, there seems to be a strong Bugis influence, and the "bulge" below the mouth is present as well as the gap between the blade and gangya in that area. Obviously another very old example. Am I seeing some flattening of the left side of the tang in the third picture? Do you a measurement for the length of the tang?


Thanks to Federico for allowing his sword to be presented here.

[Rafngard]

Hello Ian,

Originally Posted by Ian

Am I seeing some flattening of the left side of the tang in the third picture? Do you a measurement for the length of the tang?

I think that's just a trick of the pictures. Let's just say that these photos were not taken in a studio.
I don't have tang measures, but could probably get them in the future.

Thanks,
Leif