6th November 2006 Press Release

It is often amazing what can turn up in a box of odds and ends in an auction room, take, for example, these two knives. First, they have remained in splendid condition though the wear on the silver ferules shows that they have survived for a couple of hundred years.

The pistol handles are soft paste porcelain decorated in blue. Chantilly, France, is the factory which springs to mind looking at the decoration of delicate lambrequins in blue which have merged with the soft body of the paste.

The blades of steel are marked with a French cutlers mark. The cutlass shape has an interesting story.

In early times people carried about their own knives for eating. Then by the seventeenth century came the idea of a place setting for each guest with a knife and spoon. Forks were very late in coming, not until the late seventeenth century. Meat was cut with a knife and then conveyed to the mouth by the spoon..

Now, the earliest table knives were like daggers and quarrels arising at meal times often resulted in them being just so used.

It has been suggested that Louis XIV, the Sun King of France, master of ceremony and etiquette, decreed that knives should no longer be pointed but blunt ended scimitar shape. This design persisted from the seventeenth to the mid eighteenth century when the now familiar straight sided knife appeared. Note however, the rounded blunt end still continues.

Steel blades look pretty good and there is nothing better to slice meat thinly. Vegetables leave nasty stains on steel blades so they needed cleaning after every meal. The most junior servant was allotted this task, involving emery powder and a piece of cork on a scrubbing board. Stainless steel did away with this chore.

Complimentary valuation events are held Mondays and Thursdays from 9.30am to 11.30am at Friary House, 47 Uttoxeter New Rd, Derby. Phone 01332 296369 for further information and appointments at home.