Balinese ‘Tiuk Pengentas’ knife
Price
Status
Available
Region
South East Asia (Burma, Thailand, Indonesia, the Philippines)
(Buleleng, Bali)
Period
19th century
Materials
Steel, Iron, Brass, Silver, Horn.
Description
The ‘Tiuk Pengentas’ is a knife used for funerary ceremonies. Most Balinese believe in reincarnation and when a deceased person will be cremated, it will be first transported in public with a large procession. Then the priest cuts the fabric cord of the deceased from the body with the ‘Tiuk Pengentas’ which resembles cutting the person loose from earthly life, both physically as mentally.
The term ‘wedung’ is often used for these ceremonial knives, but ‘wedung’ is a Javanese term, used for a Javanese ceremonial knife. The term ‘Tiuk Pengentas’ is Balinese Bahasa and specifically from Buleleng and Singaraja.
These Balinese examples are commonly known for their decoration with brass, gold or ocassionally silver inlay and typical ‘Naga’ monster on top of the spine as is also seen on another example here in our catalogue.
This example:
A rather elegant and unusual example with stylized karbouw horn hilt, enclosed in brass ferrules. The right side of the blade features a complex thick silver inlay decoration of foliage in typical Balinese manner. The spine features a steel chiseled stylistic ‘naga’ demon and has segmented sections filled with brass. The left side of the blade features an engraved decoration of foliage surrounding a small fuller which runs through the central segment of the blade.
Balinese ‘Tiuk Pengentas’ knife
Condition
Good condition
Dimensions
Hilt length: 14.5cm
Blade length: 25cm
Blade spine thickness: 6.5mm
Total length: 39.5cm
Weight
425g.
Comparable items
– Collection Wereld Museum acc. nr. RV-Liefkes-239
Provenance
Dutch private collection
Literature
– Albert G van Zonneveld’s “Traditional Weapons of the Indonesian Archipelago”, page 74, Fig 287.