Kpinga / Shongo (multi-bladed throwing knife)
Asymmetric iron throwing weapon of the Azande with three or more curved radiating blades, used in warfare and as prestige currency; also rendered shongo in regional literature.
The kpinga (also recorded as shongo depending on regional dialect and source) is among the most immediately recognisable objects associated with Azande material culture. It is forged from iron with a primary sickle-shaped blade and two or more subsidiary lateral blades set at angles calculated to ensure that at least one edge strikes a target regardless of the knife's rotational attitude in flight. This aerodynamic logic confirms its origin as a genuine projectile weapon rather than a purely symbolic form.
Prestige versions, distinguished by geometric surface patterning, finely worked blade profiles and hafts wrapped in leather or copper wire, circulated as bride-wealth payments and markers of chiefly standing, acquiring secondary social and economic significance without losing their identity as weapons. Scholarly consensus holds that the prestige register developed alongside, not instead of, the martial one. In market catalogues these objects are frequently misdescribed as exclusively ceremonial; collectors should treat that designation as a simplification unless supported by specific contextual evidence. The kpinga is documented in the ethnographic literature from the late nineteenth century and appears in colonial-era European collections from the 1880s onwards.