Quote:
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Originally Posted by mariusgmioc
Rock crystal daggers were not built as functional daggers but more like dress/ceremonial daggers. While some of them may be capable of delivering a deadly blow, most of them would break at at the slightest impact.
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from a knife maker that makes gemstone grips:
"This ridiculous notion of fragility occurs because people think all rock is glass, or that rock is somehow too fragile for a knife handle. These same people wouldn't dare have a tile floor would they, because it might chip or crack. They wouldn't have a granite countertop because it might chip or crack. I bring up these ridiculous comparisons because those same folks would swear by the strength and durability of granite and tile, and most gemstones used on fine custom handmade knives are many times harder, tougher, and overly stronger than those materials. As I've stated before on this very site, the tip of the knife blade is the most fragile part of any knife, and if you drop it on a rock, or use it to pry, it will snap. In the several thousand gemstone handled knives I've made over thirty years, I've only had one small chip. ONE. One in two thousand. The guy dropped it just right on another piece of stone. How many micarta or wood handles would be scarred, dinged, dented, cracked, dried out, stained, scratched, gouged, scuffed, or discolored? By the way, gemstone does not scar, ding, dent, crack, dry out, stain, scratch, gouge, scuff, or discolor. In ten thousand years when the blade is nothing but dust, the bolsters too, and any resemblance to a knife has long been lost to history, the handle will look like the day it left the shop. Look to history for the answer. The longest lasting, most enduring pieces ever made in the history of mankind are made of stone."
if they were that fragile, we'd not ever come across them & they'd not command high prices.
i think you'd be surprised at how short historic tangs could be and still function as designed. odd that the ancients made do with stub and partial tang weapons well into the age of gunpowder, and the modern full tang craze came after edged weapons were no longer the primary combat weapon. how the knife is mounted onto the grip doesn't always require a long bulky tang.