Cutler

Cutler in a German book of estates, 1568

Sculpture of a knife at the knife museum in Steinbach an der Steyr

Kunz Schleich, a cutler in 1535, pictured in the house book of the Landauer Twelve Brothers House Foundation

A cutler or blade smith is a craftsman who specializes in making knives and small blade tools . The craft of cutlery was widespread in the Middle Ages, but is now one of the dying crafts.

Germany

Today the art of cutlery is often continued as a hobby or for reasons of tradition. In Germany, the traditional professional designation of cutlery was replaced by the designation of cutlery mechanic at the end of the 1980s . The profession today includes the manufacture of knives and other cutting tools either as individual pieces using traditional methods or industrially in series as well as the sharpening and maintenance of industrial cutting machines and the sale of cutlery and cutlery. Very few cutting tool mechanics can actually still practice the skills they have learned and demonstrated in the master’s examination in their professional life: designing and manufacturing complete knives.

In Germany, Solingen is considered the traditional “capital” of cutlers, and the German Blade Museum is also located there . About 80 knife makers - not necessarily blacksmiths - have organized themselves in the German Knife Makers Gilde (DMG) , which was founded in 1986 and is based in Stuttgart .

The Bayerischer Rundfunk has documented the decline of this craft in a documentary series about dying handicrafts with the film about the "cutler from Görlitz". (The film can be borrowed - see web links.)

The workshop of a cutler is shown in the folklore and open-air museum Roscheider Hof in Konz . A traditional cutler can e.g. B. watch in Herrstein (Hunsrück) at work (castle forge).

Austria

In Austria, cutlers belong to the so-called independent trades .

In Trattenbach (municipality of Ternberg) the whole place is included in an open-air museum for knife production. The Trattenbacher Taschenfeitel has been made there for centuries . The knife museum Steinbach an der Steyr also shows the local history of the knife makers and blade smiths. It depicts the craft, its importance for the population and regional settlement development.

Switzerland

The Swiss cutler Karl Elsener founded the Swiss Cutlery Association in 1884 (see also Victorinox ). Since 1891 the cutlers have been organized in the Association of Swiss Master Cutlers.

Web links

Wiktionary: Cutler  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations

Commons : Cutlers  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• The Cutler (2004). Film documentation about the old cutlery trade and Fritz Lattka, film can be borrowed from the media office.
• Web presence of the German Knife Makers Guild
• Web presence of the knife museum Steinbach an der Steyr

Individual evidence

1. ↑ About the guild. Presentation of DMG. (No longer available online.) Archived from the original on September 12, 2011 ; Retrieved January 14, 2012 .