The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of December 26, 2025

Shiny, silver metal, curved-blade knife with a medium-brown wood scabbard mimicking its curve. The blade widens and it curves down, the lower edge cut at a diagonal. The handle transitions from brown-string wrapped to light-yellow-brown carved with organic shapes and jutting down in an angular lower-case "r" shape, dark-brown hair strands extending from the top. From the scabbard hang braided pink, yellow-orange, and dark-blue ropes, knotted together and ending in fluffy multi-colored balls.

Knife (Mandau) and scabbard

c. 1900

Philippines

metal, wood, bone, hair, and braided cloth cord
Blade: 47.3 cm (18 5/8 in.)
Gift of J. H. Wade 1916.745
Location: Not on view

Did You Know?

Borneo is the third largest island in the world.

Description

Both a work of art and a weapon, blades of this type with elaborately carved and plumed hilts were used mainly by the Dyak people of Kalimantan, on the Indonesian Island of Borneo.
  • ?–1916
    Mr. Jeptha Homer Wade II [1857–1926], Cleveland, OH, given to the Cleveland Museum of Art
    1916–
    The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
  • {{cite web|title=Knife (Mandau) and scabbard|url=false|author=|year=c. 1900|access-date=26 December 2025|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1916.745