Title
Ritual dagger or knife
Year/Period
19th - first half of the 20th century
Region
Java, Indonesia
Object Type
Material
Technique
Dimension
Object size: 22.0 x 4.0 x 1.0 cm
Accession No.
2018-00968
Collection of
Credit Line
Gift of the City of Delft, Netherlands
This unusual knife relates to an archaic form of blade known variously as a kudi, kujang or chundrik in various parts of Java. Its integrally forged handle is in the shape of an abstracted human figure, which suggests that it may have served a talismanic purpose similar to the keris sajen, a small iron handled keris which also has an anthropomorphic figure for a hilt.
