We'd like to use analytics cookies to understand which symbols people look up, so we know what to research next. They are not used for advertising and we set none of them unless you say yes. What we store.
A three-pronged spear head, the attribute of Shiva.
Also known as: Trishul, Shiva trident, Hindu trident
The trishula is a three-pronged spear, the attribute of Shiva and one of the most recognisable Hindu symbols. The three prongs are given several readings — creation, preservation and destruction; the three gunas; past, present and future — and no single one is definitive. It is carried by ascetics, planted at shrines, drawn on temple walls and worn as jewellery, and a Western reader meeting it out of context regularly takes it for a classical trident or an occult device.
Is the attribute of Shiva, and is planted at shrines, carried by ascetics and drawn on temple walls as a mark of his presence.
Contexts: Religion
Has several standard readings of its three prongs — creation, preservation and destruction; the three gunas; the three tenses — and no single reading is authoritative. A source that gives only one is choosing among them.
The readings differ between traditions and commentators; the record lists the common ones rather than endorsing one.
Contexts: Religion
A long straight shaft ending in three points: a central spike flanked by two shorter prongs that curve outward and up from a common base.
Both are three-pronged forks.