FINEST Antique BROSSARD France Chef's Carbon Steel Paring Knife RAZOR SHARP

Please read our Terms below for details. PLEASE NOTE: We take our photos in natural light outdoors and as a result there are sometimes reflections or shadows or glare shown in the blades. In person none of these exist; we will say so in the description if it may be otherwise. As you can clearly see in the photographs, this beautifully crafted antique French chef's paring knife is nothing less than a work of the cutler's art, beautifully preserved despite being well over 120 years old. It comes to us as part of a larger collection of antique French cutlery we recently acquired for resale and it's the only one exactly like it I've yet seen in over 60 years of active collecting. Its identifying marks have partially been worn smooth by scrubbing and usage, but they remain clearly stamped enough to unmistakably identify this knife as having been made by Brossard, one of the many family-owned, pre-Sabatier companies who once used pictographic and/or numeric icons on their blades to permit illiterate chefs to recognize and order the brand. In this early generation of Brossard knives, their pictographic icon was a spoon (though that spoon looks more like a king's scepter or a surgeon's scalpel when seen in a clear example) along with the name "Spoon" in French ("Cuillere, " sometimes with, sometimes without an accent on the second syllable) "Gimme three "spoon" paring knives, and one lion cleaver, " a chef might tell a salesman. I say pre-Sabatier because the construction of this knife, with its heavy-duty clad pewter bolsters, indicates an age of the mid-mid/late 1800's. All of that should be a secondary consideration to its performance in any kitchen, though, because this knife was made to be used and to be used expertly by only the most demanding of chefs for whom precision on every cut is of the utmost importance. Despite its pedigree or maker, there can be no denying the outstanding beauty and utility of such a piece, nor the quality of its superb, hand-forged carbon steel blade and ebony handles. As you can see in the photos, the blade is carbon steel, hafted onto beautifully patinated handles of the highest quality, pinned and riveted over the full tang using three iron pins, then reinforced at the bolster. Unlike most French pieces, however, it doesn't use the traditional birdshead pommel, like a classic Sabatier might, which is an excellent way to date the knife as being from the period of roughly 1860--1880 or so. It measures 9.5" long with a very sturdy 5" blade that is RAZOR sharp. Expertly hand-forged from virgin steel, it's as good as it gets and beats by a mile just about anything in the modern market, where robotically controlled mass production has all but eliminated craftsmanship from cutlery, as any visit to your local mall will confirm.

In even the most demanding kitchen, it can do just about any task demanded of it, from peeling and paring, to light-duty slicing, to small chopping chores, its usefulness is limited only by your imagination. You KNOW how difficult the smaller pieces of vintage French cutlery are to obtain, since their owners part with them only after death. But to find one of this quality and condition may very well be a once in a lifetime opportunity. An heirloom quality piece for the serious user and/or collector.

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The item "FINEST Antique BROSSARD France Chef's Carbon Steel Paring Knife RAZOR SHARP" is in sale since Monday, September 7, 2020. This item is in the category "Collectibles\Kitchen & Home\Flatware, Knives & Cutlery\Flatware Sets".

The seller is "ralph1396" and is located in Los Angeles, California. This item can be shipped worldwide.

Country/Region of Manufacture: France