[Radu Transylvanicus]

(continuation)

PHURBA (pron.: fur-baa) also known as phurpa, kila, phurbha and so on is much like a metal stake with an elaborated grip.
The phurba is the male (yang / linga) counterpart of the more rounded feminine (yin / yoni) kartrika as the duality would suggest in my personal supposition. Obviously its use would take place by thrusting not by slashing like the one before it.
In many examples kartrika and phurba become one and the same weapon fashioned in a similar manner to the medieval Eurasian halberds.
I see these daggers as being useless in combat and of no man to man martial purpose whatsoever but I am striving to find the ceremonial exact use of this daggers and to what percentage were they spiritual, symbolic or utilitarian. I find the level of craftsmanship in decorations to be absolutely fantastic with a myriad of grotesque figures sculpted in their bodies similar in shape and purpose to the Javan-Balinese Raksasa deity from the Kerises handle (hulu). Eventually, both daggers were used in shamanistic rituals to chase away evil spirits and since phurbas were also known to be made of wood, the wooden stakes against malefic spirits remains known until today but I doubt there’s much connection to the timber. Most of them still remain made of metal from silver (again silver is another material known to subdue malefic spirits), bronze or iron. Phurbas were driven in the ground in the middle of a circle by an initiated shaman only during religious ceremonies.
At least in Tibet, when they are most common, other tools are associated with these anti-malefic spiritual shamanistic cleansing processes, they are less of a weapon but still of sacrificial or exorcising purpose like kapala (drinking cup made of real skulls, overwhelmingly human ones but not only) or another set of dual yin/yang tools : the bell (ghantha) and the ,,thunderbolt tool,, (dorje or vajra who is in essence many times the handle of a phurba or a kartrika).
As a traveling mountaineer as well as a arms and armour collector I came across an unfortunate wave of mass produced Himalayan daggers of a more or less finesse and authenticity in reproduction destined for the tourist market coming from both Indian or Chinese sources and one must exert caution when examining. Still, there is plenty of more or less old authenticity around so we can plunge into a deeper study ...
P.S. Images you see here are obtained via Google.com with no claims of authenticity or age but will clearly serve the purpose of quickly illustrating my notes, I would love to have people post their own more veridic images along comments.