ddean said:
How much value does the scabbard add?
Quality of scabbard?
Keris is something I keep intending to research further.
Pretty nifty items.
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<>call me 'Dean'
Dean I don't know how much or how important the scabbards are, or their value, but the handles on some keris have as much or more value than the blade itself.
And with that being so I imagine the scabbard would play a large part in the collection of keris.
Many of the scabbards are made of beautiful exotic wood with many variations in materials of the actual piece of the scabbard that holds the blade.
Of the two I have each have a different wood at the top, the boat shaped piece, one has a brass pice that holds the blade. I'd have to look at the other to remember the material that holds the two pieces of real tortoise shell that's inlayed into the front of it.
Both of my scabbards have seen repair and aren't as nicely finished as some are.
A keris is a complicated knife like the katana is a complicated sword. There is a name for each of the grooves on the blade, the curves, luk, the piece with the grain running crosswise to the blade at the top of the blade, the ganja. I was amazed at the complexity of the keris and all the names for each and every pice of it!
I just like 'em, never been interested enough to learn all the nomenclature and such, kinda like the katana.
I'm betting Bill Marsh will know though.
I need to take some detailed pix and send to Bill to see if he could tell me what I have.
I bought the nice one for $22.50 in San Jacinto Cal years ago and the other, which appears to be very old, at one of the gun shows here for $50.00 just a few years back, got it for the tortoise inlay.
