A Balinese Keris for Analysis

A. G. Maisey · 21st September 2020, 10:17 PM

Charles, I suggest that you remove the hilt from the keris.

I believe that you will find that this hilt is sitting on top of the selut, not fitted to the selut.

Any selut is effectively a ferrule, it is supposed to fit around the base of the hilt, and was originally used to prevent the hilt splitting. On the keris under discussion I believe you will find that the hilt simply sits on top of the selut.

The hilt itself is an East Javanese style, it can also be found in Madura, and Madura itself is a part of East Jawa, and it can be found along the North Coast of Jawa, but only a small distance to the west of Surabaya, whereas it can be found anywhere east of Surabaya. There can be no question at all that this is an East Javanese hilt.

We can forget about the size of the hilt being any sort of indicator, size is totally irrelevant in this context.

There is at least one hypothetical, but I will not address that until after the hilt has been removed from the keris.

21st September 2020, 10:17 PM	#12
A. G. Maisey Member Join Date: May 2006 Posts: 6,736	Charles, I suggest that you remove the hilt from the keris. I believe that you will find that this hilt is sitting on top of the selut, not fitted to the selut. Any selut is effectively a ferrule, it is supposed to fit around the base of the hilt, and was originally used to prevent the hilt splitting. On the keris under discussion I believe you will find that the hilt simply sits on top of the selut. The hilt itself is an East Javanese style, it can also be found in Madura, and Madura itself is a part of East Jawa, and it can be found along the North Coast of Jawa, but only a small distance to the west of Surabaya, whereas it can be found anywhere east of Surabaya. There can be no question at all that this is an East Javanese hilt. We can forget about the size of the hilt being any sort of indicator, size is totally irrelevant in this context. There is at least one hypothetical, but I will not address that until after the hilt has been removed from the keris.