Gun show provenance and collectible (?) knives
I'd be right careful about buying any sort of "Revolutionary fascine knife", no matter how much they look like the photos in collector books. That hook-bill shape was used all over the world for cutting brush, trimming tea and coffee
plants, etc., etc. The main problem at hand is to find out where the particular rusty relic (typically unmarked, or if marked, undocumented) actually originated.
In my experience, LOTS of these have come from Mexico, where they use
them to this day--I used to travel down there, and have a beer case or
two of them, some whole, some broken, that I bought in Mexico. And they
ARE rusty. And they DO look old (and some of them probably ARE old),
and I defy you to definitely tell by style or looks, that they started life south of the border!
Bill
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