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CHAPTER THREE

LONDON-MADE KNIVES IN THE CUTLERS’ COLLECTION

The collection
For many years a small collection of mainly 19th century knives and forks was held in Cutlers’ Hall. This collection appears to have been the result of a special effort made in the late 19th century to assemble examples of cutlery produced in London by members of the Company. We have called this the “Cutlers’ Original Collection” and it is known to have been added to irregularly over the years. The items were tied by wires to boards, with numbers by each, and kept in a set of drawers. A list of the items exists but is not very informative. There is no evidence that any of the pieces had been in regular use for meals in the Hall. A large and very comprehensive canteen of cutlery (including egg spoons, asparagus servers, etc.) that was in use in Cutlers’ Hall before the First World War still exists. The knives in this are stamped ”Cutlers’ Hall” but, perhaps significantly, do not bear the words ‘London made’.
In 1962 the Company acquired from Liveryman Howard Embleton-Smith his celebrated collection of British and Continental cutlery. The chief glory of this is the extensive continental material, much of it in extremely fine condition but there are also a significant number of important British (London, provincial and Scottish) pieces. Since 1962 the Company has continued to add to the collection: this process has accelerated in recent years as gaps in the collection have been identified.

London Made

A knife has been identified as London Made if:

a. it bears the words ‘London Made’ or

b. it carries the London dagger mark or

c. it bears the name of a known London cutler or

d. it has no dagger mark but bears a mark granted to a London cutler and was found in London or

e. it bears an unregistered mark but may be dated to a period prior to the registration of marks, was found in London and is of a type of knife more often found in London than in other parts of the country or

f. in the case of knives with blades of precious metal it bears a London hall-mark and a London maker’s mark.


Nevertheless, it should be borne in mind that cutlers in provincial towns such as Birmingham and Sheffield (and even the cutlers of Solingen in Germany) sometimes deliberately placed London marks on their own work before those cities gained their own high reputations. Equally, where there is no dagger, but only a known mark, this could be the legitimate mark of a cutler working outwith London. It is also believed that some London cutlers bought in provincial blades and marked them as their own; but this seems highly unlikely in the case of 19th century knives marked ‘London Made’. It is known from family recollections of members of the Company that the remaining London cutlers were proud to have survived the hegemony of Sheffield and used the ‘London Made’ mark as a selling point indicative of quality.


Even a name on a blade must be viewed with some caution; in 1703 Ephraim How advertised in the London Gazette to warn purchasers against knives marked ‘NOW’ ‘for there is no Cutler whose name is NOW.’

Membership of the Cutlers’ Company
Where cutlers are noted as ”not recorded as members of the Cutlers’ Company” despite their mark being granted by the Company this implies that they were freemen of other City Companies; the only stipulation being that those who struck the dagger mark must be free of the City of London. For instance we know that John and Joseph Jencks were members of the White Bakers’ Company (though cutlers by trade) and Henry Sergeant was a Barber-Surgeon.

Carving Knife
By an unidentified cutler in the 14th century

Blade: Leaf-shaped, the tip broken off, probably with a whittle-tang. No bolster.
Handle: Bone, carved as a stylised frog. The end of the handle has an inset plug which could conceal a tang plate.
Dimensions: 290mm overall.
Marks: On the blade, a six-pointed star.

Provenance: Howard Embleton-Smith collection.
This knife once belonged to Dr Charles R Beard and Embleton-Smith stated that it was excavated in the City of London.
Note: Recent, incomplete examples of the same type of knife, found in London and now in the Museum of London suggest that it is London-made (Cowgill, et al. 1987). In the catalogue of the exhibition ’Masterpieces of Cutlery and the Art of Eating’ it is stated that this knife is ‘believed to be the earliest surviving English carving knife’. However, apart from those in the Museum of London, there is now at least one other in a private collection, e.g. see item B52 in the catalogue of the Art and Evolution of Cutlery Exhibition (Goldsmiths’ Company, 1999).
Exhibited: ‘Masterpieces of Cutlery and the Art of Eating’ 1979. No. 1.
Cutlery Collection Number: 176

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