Page 13 - Bonhams Indian and Himalayan Art March 2016 New York

5
A LARGE COPPER ALLOY AND IRON BON PURBHA
Tibet, 12th/13th century
The tripartite blade emerging from the jaws of a serpent-spewing
makara below a central ‘thread mansion’ grip incised with yungdrung
(svastika), rising to a three-sided bust of a deity holding daggers below
a mythic bird (kyung), surmounted by a six-armed and three-faced
deity with daggers and his consort in yabyum.
18 3/8 in. (46.6 cm) long
$30,000 - 50,000

西藏 十二／十三世紀 苯教金剛橛

This fascinating, rare, and early ritual dagger (purbha), large and
heavy in the hand, is wrought unaffectedly with a sense of intense,
bound activity. The endless-knot grip appears to constrict like taut
leather before the eyes. One can almost hear the sound. The bulging
eyes of the fanged three-sided deity (cast in the 12th-/13th-century
style redolent of a figure of Hayagriva, published in Rhie & Thurman,
Wisdom & Compassion, New York, 1991, no. 54) seem to burst with
animate energy.

According to legend, Padmasambhava introduced purbhas to Tibet
to subdue forces hostile to Buddhism. Extraordinary tales of magic
are associated with them, but there are no texts to explain, and their
secrets are guarded by practitioners.

Adding to its rarity, this example belongs to Tibet’s indigenous Bon
religion. Key markers, in contrast to Buddhist versions of the same
period – such as one sold at Bonhams, New York, 18 September
2013, lot 3 – are the absence of a vajra in the grip, the presence of
yungdrung around its center, and absence of Buddhist deities. Instead,
identified by his three heads, six daggers, and consort with skull cup,
this purbha manifests the Bon deity Purbha Drugse Chempa.

In his study of Tibetan ritual daggers, Huntington found only “two
phur-pa of this type... during my examination of hundreds of these
implements” (Huntington, The Pur-pa, Ascona, 1975, pp. 23-4, figs.
24 & 25). One is held in the Indian Museum, Calcutta. Since then, two
other Bon purbhas have been identified, listed: www.himalayanart.org/
search/set.cfm?setID=2495, and a likely third, from the same period,
published in Thurman & Weldon, Sacred Symbols, New York, 1999,
pp. 150-1, no. 69.

Referenced
HAR - himalayanart.org/items/61444

Provenance
Private New York Estate
Sotheby’s, New York, 26 March 1998, lot 185
Private Canadian Collection, since 2011

INDIAN, HIMALAYAN & SOUTHEAST ASIAN ART | 11