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Where'd you get the info on them being half-tanged?

Sean, Just from the rivet placement. Look in General Cutlery at the small steak knife. Yes, instead of brass rivets they should have steel pins. Shoot sharp, Mike

To take this back to ol Naphtali's original post, I would suggest picking up a copy of that Fur Trade Cutlery Sketchbook. Its a great, inexpensive source for examples of knives ranging from the 1600s to the 1900s. You can get it from the Museum of the Fur Trade for $8 (and help support the museum) or from TOW and other sources for $7. There are also some good articles on period knives in the MFT Quarterly back issues. Also, Madison Grant's book is a classic, but the dates in it are somewhat speculative. It covers more of the American made stuff. TOW has it for $36.

Sean

Sacmntman, you said "Many had forged integral bolsters and full tangs." For these type knives, the French seemed to favor forge welding separate bolsters on the blades, rather than acually forging them from the bar stock. Do you know if the English may also have done theirs that way? This French method was mentioned on the old Lanouvelle/France website, which is temporarily gone for a while.

Wick,

I've been on the mountain for a couple of days. I can't really tell from the English and American cartouche knives I've seen, but I suspect they were forged integrally using trip hammers and dies by the early 1800's.

Sean

Hey WBE !iffin you were lookin at the top or bottom of the handle of those knives,how much of the tang would you be able to see? i have a couple blades on my bench shaped just like those english blades and i would like set them up period style. thanks

I make mine about half way, give or take a tad. Maybe two and a quarter inches. They also should be tapered to almost a knife edge. The originals came with grips that fit close on top, but often over shot the bottom leaving an open gap that was filled with cutlers rezin. This was due to the makers using one size grips to fit all. The French, and I believe the English also, offered three sizes in scalper knives. Small, medium, and large, and did not print any exact specs on them. And yes, use iron pins. Two of about 1/8" for French, and three 3/32" for English. Of course there are occasional variations for both. The English, going back to the over sized grips, acually drilled their pin holes low in the tang, so that they would appear center in the oversized grip on all but the large models, and maybe they were even oversized. Don't know about that.