copper alloys (brass, bronze)

[Waruno Mahdi]

>  In a way, it's just a problem of the English language.  Malay
>  uses kuningan for "yellow brass" (brass with a high zinc content)
>  but tembaga for darker brasses as well as copper and bronze.

This has been a terribly interesting discussion, but I've been so
busy with other chores (and I'll be gone for ten days as of tomorrow),
that I had no time to join in. Just this short blurt though:

Malay also has perunggu "bronze", and the standard Indonesian term
for 'Bronze Age' is Zaman Perunggu. The technical term for the
chemical element Cu, Latin cuprum 'copper', is tembaga, but
inofficially the latter is indeed also used for some alloys, though
not so much for either the darker ones, nor the very light-colored
(yellow) ones. Another term for 'bronze' that includes dark (bronze-
like) alloys is gangsa, but it is not as narrowly defined as perunggu
for 'bronze'.

For the lighter alloys, Besides kuningan for 'yellow brass', there
still is loyang, that refers somewhat more explicitly to the light
(yellow) alloys than even kuningan (the latter my also be heard/read
used in reference to copper, although derived from the word kuning
'yellow').

Aloha,  Waruno
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