Yes Spiral, I tend to agree with you.
One of my very close friends is extremely knowledgeable in respect of khukri, he's married to a Nepalese lady and his father in law is a Brahmin who taught at an Indian university, his family connections in Nepal go to the highest level. He is not well known as a "khukri expert", because he chooses not to promote himself, and he has never published on the subject, but I have known him for more than 20 years, and have never known him to be incorrect in anything at all to do with Nepal, or with the Hindu faith.
The khukri, is actually a typical example of a common tool being used as a weapon.It most definitely is a general purpose tool, but a general purpose tool that also has distinct weapon forms, apart from the fact that a villager could use exactly the same khuk he uses to split wood with, as a weapon.It also has the status of national identity. Actually, in some ways it parrallels the bendha in Jawa; the bendha is a general purpose Javanese knife, looks a bit like a European pruning hook, and in Central Jawa it is used for splitting wood, lopping branches, hammering nails, clearing brush--- any purpose where a general purpose cutter can be used. But Raffles recorded it as weapon, and in the Surakarta Kraton, super size bendha were used in execution of criminals.
Similarly, the Madurese celurit, which is one of the most feared weapons in Indonesia today, is actually only a sickle. It has many forms, some designed for reaping, some for splitting wood, and some are definitely weapons. The same theme repeats and repeats throughout history, where people who use a particular tool in their daily work will then use the same tool as a weapon, then that tool develops specialised forms, and when it climbs out of the farmer's fileds into the king's palace, it becomes a work of art with gold inlay and an ivory handle.
The personal account I have of the piha can really only be a certified account of the piha as seen by the descendants of a court scribe who used it as I have described. Logically, where a stylus was present---and this type of piha seems to be pretty rare--- such a piha could probably be taken to be a scribe's knife.However, where a stylus was not present, it is concieveable that the knife could have had a weapon function. But I find it rather difficult to envisage such a design being produced purely for a weapon purpose. Possibly it may have parralleled the symbolism of the Javanese wedung, which was and is something never intended for use, but purely to symbolise a particular level in the court heirarchy.
Jim, on the spelling "pihaya".
The language used in Sri Lanka was not originally written in our alphabet. When we try to represent spoken sounds from any language in an alphabet that grew around totally different languages we do find problems, and accomodations need to be made.
Similarly, the addition of , or subtraction of , a prefix or suffix to a root word can often have varied meanings and/or implications dependent upon context, and also dependent upon historical period.
Personally, I'd be more than happy to call a piha simply a "Sri Lankan knife"; only reason I call it a piha is because it immediately conjures up an image for most people reading what I have written in this Forum.
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