What is the name of the key to Shambhala in Uncharted 2?

The name of the key to Shambhala in Uncharted 2 is the phurba. In the game, it is a distinctive ritual dagger that functions as the mechanism for locating and opening the route to the hidden kingdom.

Nathan Drake and his companions discover the phurba while investigating the fate of Marco Polo’s lost expedition in Borneo. A map associated with the dagger reveals that its wielder can find a temple in Nepal containing the passage to Shambhala. Drake later uses the weapon in the temple to activate the entrance and continue the search for the Cintamani Stone.

The word phurba is based on a real Indo-Tibetan ritual implement, also called a kīla. Traditional phurbas commonly have a three-sided blade and are associated with Vajrayana Buddhist and Bön practices. A common mix-up is to identify the Cintamani Stone as the key; it is the treasure sought inside Shambhala, while the phurba is the object that helps unlock the path there. Shambhala is also linked in the game to the Western name Shangri-La.