What in the world is this knife?

What 91bravo has said.

Most likely a bolsterless “ barehead” serpentine stockman with carbon steel blades and likely with synthetic handle scales (which are obviously missing).
As the tang stamp says, Made in Germany, likely post WWII.
 
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littleknife said:
Most likely a bolsterless “ barehead”
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I don’t think so. What it looks like it had were hollow stamped sheetmetal handles made to look like bolsters, with a thin plastic film over the middle to mimic covers. You can see where the tabs on the hollow handles would have folded into the notches in the liners.

This was common construction on inexpensive knives like this Imperial:

XvZcIB3.jpg

u38Ept9.jpg
 
Danke42 said:
Looks like a Swiss Army sort of flavor. It likely had covers on it when new.
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Actually, it has no resemblance to a Swiss Army Knife at all other than they are both non-locking folding knives. As others have said, it looks like a stockman pattern that once had clam-shell bolsters and some kind of handle scales which are now missing. Appears to have been made in Germany too...... ; )
 
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riversidedep said:
Actually, it has no resemblance to a Swiss Army Knife at all other than they are both non-locking folding knives. As others have said, it looks like as stockman pattern that once had clam-shell bolsters and some kind of handle scales which are now missing. Appears to have been made in Germany too......; )
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+1 to all of this.


I’ll add that you may get even closer to IDing the knife if you post this in the Trad subforum.
 
The knife is in very bad condition so its pretty hard to say for sure.....but a company by the name of Ernst Lohr Sohne KG of Solingen Germany was apparently making shell handled knives before WW2 and for some time after. There is a 1935 US patent that describes such a construction method using various materials, including leather, wrapped on a hollow handle, granted to Otto Ernst Stiehl and Ernst Lohr, along with an identical application in Germany in 1934. I seem to remember something from years ago that said this design was the basis for the Imperial shell handled knives.
 
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Just Tom. said:
I don’t think so. What it looks like it had were hollow stamped sheetmetal handles made to look like bolsters, with a thin plastic film over the middle to mimic covers. You can see where the tabs on the hollow handles would have folded into the notches in the liners.

This was common construction on inexpensive knives like this Imperial:

XvZcIB3.jpg

u38Ept9.jpg
Click to expand...
Thanks. you may be right.
 
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