Footnotes

鐵鋄金銀骷髏杖
德格 藏東 十五世紀

This rare Vajrayana Buddhist ritual implement, known as a kapala danda ("skull club"), is believed to terrify and subjugate harmful spirits. The implement is most commonly associated with Yama Dharmaraja, "The Lord of Death", who uses it to pulverize into annihilation karmic defilements that precipitate the cycle of death and rebirth. (See, for example, Yama Dharmaraja wielding his kapala danda aloft in a gilt bronze sold at Bonhams, Hong Kong, 2 October 2018, lot 172). Attested to by its quality of construction—with brilliant damascened gold and silver spirals alternating around the faceted shaft—officials would have used this refined ceremonial object at the highest echelons of medieval Tibetan society.

The skull club's detail and workmanship are consistent with imperial ritual objects from the Yongle period (1402-24); compare Zwalf, Buddhism, British Museum, London, p.211, pl.307, and a staff in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (2015.500.6.28; Watt, Defining Yongle, New York, 2005, p. 74, pl. 27). The workshops of Derge in Eastern Tibet were famous for the damascening technique used, which was achieved by gently hammering thin strips of gold and silver sheet into roughened iron. For further examples, see Christie's, Hong Kong, 6 November 1997, lot 1068; Christie's, New York, 17 September 1998, lot 92; and Henss, Buddhist Ritual Art of Tibet, Stuttgart, 2020, pp.196-7, no.232.

Exhibited
Rituels tibétains: Visions secrètes du Vème Dalaï Lama (1617 – 1682), Musée Guimet, Paris, 6 November 2002-24 February 2003.

Published
Nathalie Bazin et al., Rituels tibétains: Visions secrètes du Vème Dalaï Lama (1617 – 1682), Paris, 2002, p.143, no.100.

Provenance
Robert Burawoy, Paris, before 2002
Private European Collection