Old copper butter knife?

Hillbilly Prince

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Aug 9, 2018
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I am guessing. This was banging around for years in an ancient cookie tin. No idea how it came to be in our family. I'm wondering if anyone has seen one of these.
It is as thin as a dime. No markings other than the leaves.
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Hmmm,

when I find old spoons, the silver plague is usually gone or olmost gone, so that the base metal shows.

But the knife blade should be always steel or iron? Leaves me a little puzzeld.


Greets Namxat
 

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Hmmm,

when I find old spoons, the silver plague is usually gone or olmost gone, so that the base metal shows.

But the knife blade should be always steel or iron? Leaves me a little puzzeld.


Greets Namxat

I can't find any indication it was ever plated. I'll try to get pics in natural light tomorrow.
 

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Nice, hang on to that one. I'd say turn of the century butter knife. Probably brass alloy, plating is gone. Doesn't have to be iron or sharp, it's just for slicing butter and spreading. There's a proper name for it but I forgot.
 

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I've found several of those same type of solid brass butter knives around old turn of the century home sites. So I'm guessing around 1900 or maybe a little earlier.
 

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Chipped beef on toast (soas) biscuits and gravy pancakes scrambled eggs sausage patties cooked on the old plug in skillet and then the 25 minutes in the old office taking care of business lol
 

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Nice, hang on to that one. I'd say turn of the century butter knife. Probably brass alloy, plating is gone. Doesn't have to be iron or sharp, it's just for slicing butter and spreading. There's a proper name for it but I forgot.

Definitely not sharp. Anything harder than butter would bend it. Might have come from one of my granparents.
 

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I've found several of those same type of solid brass butter knives around old turn of the century home sites. So I'm guessing around 1900 or maybe a little earlier.

That's interesting. It is very plain. I would think somewhere around 1900 or earlier is quite correct.
 

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Chipped beef on toast (soas) biscuits and gravy pancakes scrambled eggs sausage patties cooked on the old plug in skillet and then the 25 minutes in the old office taking care of business lol

I'm down for biscuits and gravy anytime :)
 

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Thinking about your knife being in an old cookie tin for who knows how long, maybe it was never plated. Could have been brass/bronze all along(although I have never seen one like that). Could have been in the cookie tin because it was special?
Definitely not sharp. Anything harder than butter would bend it. Might have come from one of my granparents.
 

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Really cool knife. That ornate handle is really something! Last year I found a brass spoon that showed a maker's mark but no further info about them could be found about the company. The age was determined by the basic style. Applying that approach to your find, compare the shape of the blade and collar of yours to the one below. They look pretty similar. The handle on both have some design; but yours is far more detailed. Still, as the others have already mentioned, that seems to put your knife in the late 19th-early 20th century time frame.
 

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I found a butter knife with a rounded tip in a early 1900’s site...I found a faint makers mark on the blade near the handle, worth a shot to look again with magnification
 

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