tradition – knives of France

January 16, 2021

Nontron knife

The classic Nontron knife is the oldest folding knife in France.

Nontron is the name of a village from the Dordogne region of France.

The region is naturally rich in iron ore and boxwood.

In the Roman age already, the people living there was renown for their craftmanship in iron products.

In the Fourteenth century, Nontron’s knifemaking was famous and the city was a mandatory stop for cutlers learning the art.

In the Seventeenth century, Guillaume Legrand, master cutler from Paris, settled in Nontron and started making the famous Nontron’s folding knife. He is the one who invented the ferrule, or ring lock, a few years later. As a reminder, the ring lock appeared on the Opinel knife in 1955!

In the Eighteenth century, two families, Bernard and Petit, took over the Nontron’s cutleries.

During the first World War, Nontron’s cutleries were requisitioned by the War Ministry to produce palm knives (see the article about the palm knife history). A knife remnant of that era is still produced today.

A few years after the end of the war, only the Petit cutlery was still in operation.

In 1931 Alphonse Chaperon purchased the cutlery, starting the Nontron Chaperon era, until 1986.

Today the cutlery is the property of Forges de Laguiole.

The knife is simple.

the wooden handle, traditionally in boxwood, can now be found in various woods like ebony, violet wood or some tastefully done mixes. The boxwood is really hard and sturdy and will develop a nice patina over time and turn into a nice honey yellow color.

The boxwood handles are traditionally decorated with the characteristic Nontron symbol, the “fly”, that looks like an arch, surrounded by 3 dots, and some dotted lines or stipplings.

A traditional Nontron pocket knife has 4 lines of stippling and 5 flies.

The meaning of that symbol has been lost in time and still today nourishes lots of legends: religious symbol, emblem of a guild?

The handles have, traditionally, 4 different shapes: ball, clog, fish tail and double ferrule.

Even if throughout the history various blade shapes have been seen, the “sage leaf” is the more traditional. It is now in T12 stainless (a proprietary stainless of Forges de Laguiole), but some carbon steel XC75 and Damascus steel blades are made.

The ferrule, or ring lock, is in brass on the boxwood models and nickel silver for the other types of handle.

Each step of the knife assembly is made, from beginning to end, by a single cutler: assembling the blade, pin, ferrule, handle finish, sharpening…

A real piece of history, timeless and elegant.

August 8, 2020October 4, 2021

Yatagan knife

The Yatagan knife gets its name from the Yataghan, or yatağan, a short sword in use in the Ottoman Empire until the late nineteenth century.

The blade is inspired by the sword blade.

That shape was probably bring back by the Napoleonic troops after their Egyptian campaign and the “orientalism” trend of the nineteenth century made the type popular.

The blade shape was later used to give the Laguiole knife its actual form.

It is a simple slipjoint, with its characteristic clip point blade, usually with a half-stop, a slightly arched handle and sides usually made of cattle horn.

The type was mainly used in the South-west of France.

The Basque Yatagan

Among all those South-West users were some tobacco growers who used their Yatagan to cut-off damaged or dirty tobacco leaves. But the tobacco plants produce a thick sap that was covering the knife’s handle, making it slippery.

A seller from Bergerac had the idea to add 10 protruding rivets to the handle to create some sort of grip.

That created the so-called Basque Yatagan, sometimes called only Basque knife.

Some of today’s interpretations of the knife keep those 10 rivets, but letting it flush with the handle, to make it more comfortable.

An simple yet elegant worker’s knife.

Find the Yatagan and Basque knives on http://knives-of-france.com

June 19, 2020October 4, 2021

Thiers, the French capital of knife making

The city of Thiers finds its origin in the medieval age and can claim six centuries of cutlery tradition.

The legend says that the Crusaders bring back the secret of steel but the history of knife making can be dated back to the fifteenth century as tax registers mention thirty knife makers in the city that will turn to be 200 in the sixteenth century.

Oddly enough, the city didn’t have real assets to become the capital of knife making, there is no iron ore for the blades or sandstone to make grinding wheels, but there is the Durolle, the torrent that will provide enough energy for the cutlery machines, and the obstinacy and hard work of people living on a rocky, steep and hard territory, working in the fields in summer and making blades in winter.

Long before Henry Ford, it is in the fifteenth Century that the division of labor started in Thiers with people specialized in the various steps of knife making, to the final assembly. It was not anymore a single cutler that was making the entire knife.

The working conditions were really hard. The cutlers shaping the blades on the grinding wheels were called the “yellow bellies”, because, in the unique Thiers style, they were grinding the blades laying over the wheel, with a dog on their legs to keep them warm.

They were working down in the valley, next to the water that was used to provide the power.

On top of the cold and humidity, the noise of the machines is loud and, if the grinding wheel explodes, the cutler is projected to the ceiling, with a little chance of survival.

That part of the valley is called “Hell” (L’enfer in French), one of the buildings was even called like that.

For the other specialties it is not more comfortable, the presses and hammering machines are dangerous and the temperature in the forge can reach 120F.

But that specialization and efficiency made that knife makers and merchants in various French regions were ordering knives to Thiers.

For instance, the cutlers from the village of Laguiole, in Aveyron, had to order knives in Thiers, as they were not able to keep up with the demand. Those knives were originally called “Laguiole style” before being definitively called Laguiole when all the production was finally done in Thiers.

The same story happened to different regions and cities, this is why most of the French knives have the name of a city or a region like Yssingeaux, Issoire, Alpin, Montpellier, Rouennais etc.

Thiers even produced some “Spanish” navajas.

When the city was, and is still today, making the knives of all the different French regions, it never had its own style of knife. It was corrected rather late, in 1994, when “Le Thiers” was created. It will be the object of a later article.

Today electricity definitely replaced all the water powered machines and Thiers and its surroundings is still making between 70% and 80% of the French bladed tools, earning its status of French knife making capital, with its museum and “Coutellia”, the annual international blade show.

Find some examples of fine French cutlery on http://knives-if-france.com