Why is ivory so popular, and how do you know it's age?

sogflash

sogflash

Joined
Aug 28, 2011
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It seems like ivory is a very popular handle material. What's the appeal with it?

Is it so that ivory has to be of a certain age for it to be legal? Then how to you know?
 
Not sure about the age question. I do think interest has increased lately due to the possibility that Congress may ban all ivory in the near future.
 
Ivory is a unique material. It is visually appealing to many, warm to the touch and can be worked into beautiful shapes. A lot of synthetics have been used as substitutes over the years, to varying degrees of success. I understand that some people eschew ivory on ethical grounds. Currently most custom and semi-custom knives use prehistoric ivory from Alaska, Russia etc. I doubt that it's use, tusk and tooth, will ever have any effect on the world population of wooly mammoths. Mineralized after 10,000 years of tundra burial, some of it has amazing colors and textures. And some of the interior ivory rivals modern elephant ivory in purity of color. Here is one I recently acquired handled in mammoth ivory and 5,000 year old bog oak.

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Much modern used ivory of the elephant variety is also salvaged antique material from billiard balls, piano keys etc.
 
Beautiful knife Codger! From what I understand GEC's ivory is from a tusk harvested around 1900. My #61 is Elephant Ivory from this tusk and it's beautiful.

 
sogflash said:
It seems like ivory is a very popular handle material. What's the appeal with it?
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Aesthetics - the richness of color. The warm feel and look of a natural handle material. Tradition. The exclusivity of a rare and expensive material.

Is it so that ivory has to be of a certain age for it to be legal? Then how to you know?
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Well, if it's fossilized or from a long-extinct species, the age is obvious enough.
But comparing, say, 'legal' elephant ivory from the 1800s to poached ivory of today, I don't think it's possible to know. And for that reason I don't and won't own any elephant ivory.
 
Again, it is quite possible to know the age if you or your maker are the salvager, ivory from keyboards of organs and pianos and other musical instruments which are relatively easy to date, billiard balls, old table cutlery.
 
The way I age it is I get certification from the ivory dealer I use. He has been in the business for a long time. The ban goes back to the late 60's or early 70's.
 
A certified dealer maintains CITE certification records. 1978 I thought but may be wrong.
 
Seems like scary business. I would be far to suspicious about the source of the ivory even with a certificate. Ivory handles look clean and beautiful, but ethics keep me away from it.
 
Ivory just has a rich color and ages really well. I don't own any ivory and don't support any poaching to gain it. There are a few things I'd really like to have in ivory..... a couple of knives and a custom revolver with ivory grips..... not sure if I'll ever get them.
 
You know an option to get that look without using Ivory is to use American Holly. It looks great on revolvers and should work for a knife. :)

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Woodrow F Call said:
Ivory just has a rich color and ages really well. I don't own any ivory and don't support any poaching to gain it. There are a few things I'd really like to have in ivory..... a couple of knives and a custom revolver with ivory grips..... not sure if I'll ever get them.
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Mammoth ivory is beautiful and not hard to find, fully legal to harvest, sell, buy and own. And makes beautiful pistol grips as well as knives. My example above id bark, outer ivory. But interior ivory can rang in color to match elephant ivory, new or old.

Ethics. I am reminded of my grandfather's ethics of the killing of whitetail doe deer. In his day, when a hunter hunted deer, it was illegal to kill a doe because they were trying to build the herds. Today the herds are huge and population control is an issue in many areas, hunters allowed and encouraged to take as many does a season as posible. But for the old-timers, what was a legal necessity became a matter of ethics, long after it was counterproductive to herd health. Legal ivory is much the same today.
 
This isn't aimed at anyone in particular but, let's keep the politics and ethics of "ivory" out the discussion and keep to the original topic.
 
From your question I think you are referring to modern Ivory. Before modern plastics, that's all there was to make many items out of that we take for granted these days. Hair combs, Musicial instruments, and a rich man's knife handle etc.

As noted the warmth and high dollar is part of the appeal to some. I won't own any modern Ivory and there are ways to treat poached modern Ivory so it looks old. I don't trust the paperwork ether.

I am not saying that all paperwork is falsified, but I am sure some of it is.

Anicent fossilized Ivory is another matter. Mastodon, Wooly mammoth and some walrus etc These animals are already extinct as Codger pointed out. Many natives in the northern ice bound countries make a living by finding anicent Ivorys and this should remain legal.
 
As an alternative, I like the "French Ivory," which I suppose is a type of celluloid.

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sogflash said:
It seems like ivory is a very popular handle material. What's the appeal with it?
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For me, ivory is a material that has to be experienced first-hand to really "get."

As good as modern facsimiles are (and I anticipate continued improvements), nothing compares to the Real Thing®.

It's not just ivory's appearance, but the entire tactile experience. A family friend had a set of small ivory dominoes that I was privileged to handle when I was small. The look and feel of the tiles-- their smooth coolness, their non-brittle click and clack-- haunt me to this day.

I have one ivory-handled knife:

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Here's one of my favorite pictures of all time (not just of this knife):

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Like I said, there's simply nothing else like genuine ivory.

~ P.
 
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