Lambsfoot and the spear, American and English taste?

[jackknife]

Some beautiful knives there. Are there any examples of US-made Lambsfoot pattern? It seems very strange that this pattern doesn't seem to have crossed the pond. Be great to see GEC produce one, and I hope it'd be popular

This post is inspired by a post Jack made in his lambsfoot post. I didn't want to derail the thread, so I am taking this question to another thread. Why not the lambsfoot in America?

That's something I have wondered many times. The Lambsfoot and to some extent the sheep foot, has never had the popularity of the more pointy blade styles. Look in any old Maher&Grosh or Simmons hardware catalogue, and the overwhelming blade style in pocket knives was the spear, with some clips tossed in.

I wonder if it is a cultural thing? More English gardeners than American buying pocket knives? In the U.S., the sheepfoot seems to be regulated to the same area as the hawkbill, the agricultural trades. Or as a backup secondary blade for rough use on a stickman. And looking at the wonderful old photo of the recovered knives from the riverboat wreck, spear and clips were the majority, with some congress tossed in. I know that when I was growing up, I never recall seeing a lambsfoot or sheepfoot blade on a knife. It was strictly spear and clip territory when I was a kid. But then the Lone Ranger was still riding around righting wrongs with silver bullets.

I do know that the old lore about seamen using sheeps foot blades stem from the old tale that the ships captain had the points of their knives knocked off to avoid mayhem on long voyages. So the evolution of the squared off tip on sailors knives. But I wonder why did the lambs foot gain such popularity in England but not the U.S.?

But then Americans go for a burger instead of some good fish and chips. And drink coffee instead of tea. And went nuts over the VW bug in the 60's instead of the neat little Mini. No accounting for taste I guess.

Carl.

 

[waynorth]

It is possible to attribute all sorts of causes to the current results of blade prevalence/choices.
Longer practice at what we call western civilization in England vs. brash revolutionary attitudes (the American Revolution that is) could add to the result of the more usual choice of the refined Lambfoot or Sheepfoot blade, versus the more pointy, aggressive Clip and Spear options, respectively.
I find a straight edge very useful, but often drop a spear in my pocket just out of long habit.
Carl, now you have got me thinking about the absolute best blade to have if, for instance, I could only have one!!
My Spear "Boiled Barlow" (BB) has been doing just fine since last November, but since I shipped a bundle of knives ahead to the Rendevous, I have reverted to my Wharncliffe To-Mah-Toe (TMT), and I am recalling what fun we had for a year or two!!
Life will even get MORE complicated when I get my hands on a Sheepfoot soon!
Oh what will I do????

 

[kamagong]

Great question Carl. I'm looking forward to hearing the thoughts on this subject.

On a somewhat related question, I wonder why those Americans who do like straight edged blades favor the wharncliffe over the lambsfoot?

- Christian

 

[waynorth]

Christian, I can speak in favor of the Wharncliffe, now that I have been using TMT again . That acute needle point is so darn useful! It gets right into your mail and it reaches into whittling spaces that nothing else can touch!

 

[pipedreams308]

I agree, I love that pointy point on the wharncliffe.

 

[kamagong]

Christian, I can speak in favor of the Wharncliffe, now that I have been using TMT again . That acute needle point is so darn useful! It gets right into your mail and it reaches into whittling spaces that nothing else can touch!

Yessiree. I think the wharncliffe offers increased utility over the lambsfoot, and is aesthetically more pleasing to boot.

- Christian

 

[pertinux]

I do know that the old lore about seamen using sheeps foot blades stem from the old tale that the ships captain had the points of their knives knocked off to avoid mayhem on long voyages. So the evolution of the squared off tip on sailors knives.

I'd heard that as well, and while it may have some credence (and a greater degree of "romance"), I think Pete1977 presented more plausible/practical reasons for the blade shape in an earlier thread:

The flat point was originally intended for use around sails. Even an accidental poke to a sail could cause the canvas to tear from alow to aloft. It is much safer on a pitching deck to use a blunt tipped knife however. I've stabbed myself in the palm twice with a pointed blade. Those square pointed blades are also good for hooking on the edge of the pocket and opening the knife one handed, similar to a one armed bandit razor or barlow knife.

I've also thought that the "wharncliffes" on Case's trappers and Copperheads have familiarized us Colonials with Lambsfoot blades unawares:

The blade of that lambsfoot reminds me of one of my Case "wharncliffes," seen below on the blue Mini Trapper, although the Case's blade does taper more to a point (noint noint):

Interestingly, black mamba just noted the same in another sheepsfoot thread (same Case blade, but as a main):

This main blade is usually described as a Wharncliffe, but looks more like the lambsfoot blades shown here. Case Copperhead.

Two sheepsfoot blades, a wharncliffe, and a lambcliffe:

~ P.

 

[1066vik]

I tend to like wharncliffe blades because I can't find a lambsfoot/sheepsfoot primary.
OTOH, a little belly is a good thing - a modified lamb/sheepsfoot would be a glorious thing.

 

[waynorth]

I tend to like wharncliffe blades because I can't find a lambsfoot/sheepsfoot primary.
OTOH, a little belly is a good thing - a modified lamb/sheepsfoot would be a glorious thing.

Sounds like a Zulu would suit you just fine, 1066!!


Sarah, no-one can quote within quotes within quotes like you can!!
My head is a-spinnin'!!

 

[pertinux]

Sarah, no-one can quote within quotes within quotes like you can!!
My head is a-spinnin'!!

Whoops, sorry about that.

Next time I'll just repeat myself.

~ P.

 

[neeman]

I grew up in London

Sheepsfoot and lambsfoot were the blades I saw on knives that were not campers with a spear blade
Once in a while a clip on a barlow
The Britsh Army Clasp knife is a good example of a sheepsfoot as the main blade

A typical English knife

 

[1066vik]

Menefee Zulu is a pretty knife.
but I'd be perfectly content with this one if it had just a touch of belly as well -- which it should grow over time with sufficient use & resharpening.

Neeman - I love that!

 

[JB in SC]

Since the UK is surround by ocean, I could see why a blade favored by mariners would be popular.

 

[Jack Black]

Many thanks for the thread Carl :thumbup: That Lambcliffe is pretty close isn't it P?

There are of course many ways in which our nations differ culturally, but one difference is in respect of hunting, and particularly the hunting of large game. Historically, what little large game we have here, belonged to the King and his cohorts, (even now that hasn't changed much), and a man would be executed for killing a deer for example. The North of England suffered enforced deforestation under William 1, the Norman conqueror, which must have further reduced the numbers of large game. Much later, industrialization spread rapidly, along with urbanisation, most of this country's population live in town's and cities, cut off from the woods and moors. Even today, hunting is a minority pursuit here, and mostly the preserve of the gentry.

While Sheepsfoot and Lambsfoot knives are traditionally farmer's knives, even the farmer would have made relatively little use of a hunting knife - of a knife with some belly. The Lambsfoot was a pattern carried by men in the towns and cities, who would rarely even come into contact with a rabbit, let alone a stag.

In the US, of course, things are very different, there's an amazing assortment of wildlife, and hunting for the pot, (unlike for sport, among the toffs here), was how many people fed themselves. While there are of course many huge cities, the country is nothing like as densely populated as the UK, and hunting is a mainstream blue-collar activity, unlike here. So people would have need of different sorts of blades, spears and clip-points, which would be more practical for dealing with a kill.

This is a tentative hypothesis I just thought up! Of course it still doesn't explain a lot of things, such as why the Wharncliffe and Sheepsfoot are seen in the US, but not the Lambsfoot, or why the pattern never took hold in San Francisco or New York, like it did in London or Sheffield, but to a large extent, irrespective of other factors, people carry what they're used to, and what their dad and grandad did.

Just a few thoughts anyway

Jack

 

[Jack Black]

Since the UK is surround by ocean, I could see why a blade favored by mariners would be popular.

In the past, tens of thousands of British men, would have been at sea. Britain had a vast military navy, it also had pirates and bucaneers and corsairs, and lots of poor blokes who'd been press-ganged or transported. There was the triangular slave trade, from which the wealth of many of the country's richest men can still be directly traced. Britain also had a huge fishing fleet. Then there was the canal system that runs across every county like veins on a hand. So I guess an awful lot of men might have favoured a Sheepsfoot-type blade, and they would have carried that after their days at sea, or working on the canals, were over, and passed the knife onto their sons, when they died at the early age people did back then. I'm not sure when we first see the Lambsfoot appearing, perhaps it was a slightly less wieldly variariation more suitable for city-life, maybe just a fashion that spread, or maybe there are other reasons for the prevelence of the pattern

 

[Jack Black]

The Britsh Army Clasp knife is a good example of a sheepsfoot as the main blade

I guess the adoption of a sheepsfoot blade for the army and navy knives, which were issued to millions of men, also had an influence on the continued prevelance of a 'square-ended' blade. Even today, many WW2 clasp knives are in use by gardeners and workmen, and were even more widespread in the past.

While my grandad owned both army and navy clasp knives, and a Lambsfoot, the knife he carried most had a short clip blade and a spear. I don't know if that harked back to hunting and fishing for food as a youngster in the Depression, or was simply a result of the large number of cowboy books he consumed, and a hankering after a Bowie knife!

Sorry for hogging the thread!

 

[Planterz]

I do know that the old lore about seamen using sheeps foot blades stem from the old tale that the ships captain had the points of their knives knocked off to avoid mayhem on long voyages. So the evolution of the squared off tip on sailors knives.

I've heard that, and I've also heard that sailors preferred blunt tipped knives so they'd do less damage if they were dropped - either to their own bare feet, or to anybody who might be below them as they climb on rigging. Even modern "nautical" knives are blunt-tipped sheepsfoots.

 

[Will Power]

Habit. It's a very strong force. It then becomes 'custom' lore etc.

Jack's thesis on hunting seems right. Fox hunting being or was, the preserve of 'the unspeakable in pursuit of the uneatable" You don't exactly need a knife to 'dress' an animal torn to bits by dogs..... However, rural workers would've snared (often illegally) rabbits or poached pheasants and would've used the traditional blade of the countryside the Lambfoot. Back to my habit idea, 'we' use this etc it's what there is. The Lambfoot, depending on the spring, is actually an easy knife to close one handed, you can push it against the sleeve of your coat, and being non pointy it won't make a hole in it! quite practical. It has good application in food prep too, cutting morsels etc. There is a class aspect too as this was the working blade. Urban,later suburban more bourgeois Britons likely carried smaller gents type knives with often costly construction or materials. These would be slimmer knives with multi blades or tools such as nail file, no place there for the rugged but long Lambfoot! Consider how popular Leaf shaped blades are on working knives in Continental Europe, habit/tradition utility. Such shaped blades have gained favour on modern styles of knife too.

Here it gets interesting. The Wharncliffe blade is essentially a modified Lambfoot, the legend or accepted idea being that it was commissioned by the Earl of Wharncliffe. Whether this is actually true or not I'm uncertain but it seems to have entered lore. Wharncliffe himself lived near Sheffield, the then centre of cutlery making. As Sheffield exported vast quantities of knives to an America hungry for cutlery and fast producing its own knives, different styles of knife would've been deemed more suitable for foreign markets. Larger multi blades being very popular in America, there was probably little interest in the Lambfoot which is essentially a single blade affair. Again the tendency in Europe for single blades over multis.

Perhaps the simple truth is, the Lamfoot was considered too basic for export, lowly not enticing or exciting enough so nobody bothered to offer it outside Britain? The cutlery business was highly competitive in the late c19th,. America had plenty of utility knives and the Wharncliffe eclipsed the Lambfoot or the Stockman with its Sheepfoot rendered it redundant?

I'd certainly like to see GEC for instance offer a Swell End Barehead knife with a large Rat-Tail bolster and Lambfoot. But then, they might argue it's not a 'traditional' American blade or pattern, no, no. Full circle. Interestingly enough, this year's Forum knife is going in a kind of Lambfoot direction.....

Regards, Will

 

[mnblade]

Timely thread as lately, I've been drawn to this Victorinox. Don't know if it fits the bill or not. Thoughts?



-- Mark

PS: Unfortunately, I can't seem to find it in black. I've considered red or yellow.

 

[scruffuk]

What I believe the principle causes are covered already;
- lack of (big game) hunting to all but the upper classes
- martime need and subsequent popularity (the 'holes in sails' is very much a sound reason and the one I have always heard)
- agricultural/horticultural pursuits, passtimes and employment

I wonder, is a straight edge better for sharpening a quill??