My knives

The Mjoes Orm knife

This is my best knife made in 1997 Click the pictures for a bigger format

Blade: stainless steel steel with engraving, all done by Maikhel Eklund from Sweden.            

Grip: Birch wood, an excellent choice for knifemaking, and red plastic with Taxus Baccata wood towards the blade. Today the T.B. is a protected tree, but some smaller stems are always destroyed by lumbering. This wood was earlier used for long bows and also the bow of the crossbows used to kill smaller toothed whales. The grip end is whale tooth. The motive is the Mjoes orm, and it has got red glass eyes, obtained from a taxidermist. At the back of the grip is a red lilie. The lilie motive was often used in old norse woodcarving to depict the tail of sea serpents.

Sheath: Coloured leather with hand pressed motive. The main motive is the three edged star where each limb is ending in a spiral, an old keltic/norse symbol of eternity. One limb ends in the front spiral containing the head of a small sea serpent. Another limb is rising up to the big head along the leather edge. The third one descends ending in a classic tail. The belt loop construction is my private, fitted with a front decoration. Like all my knives this one too locks into the sheath with a distinctive "click".

The traditional Hedmark knife usually has a long grip fit for a big hand. The grip most often ends in an angle and is capped with metal. Modern Norwegian hand crafted knives have often got short blades. You see some at this page. My future knives will have good length blades in accordance with the old Hedmark tradition. These will be hunting knives and  knives with the Mjoes orm whale tooth grip end. I sign stamp both leather and silver works.

One of the old norse motives is the stylized horse as it can be seen in the nearly millennium old woodcarved gate of the Urnes stave church. The current Norwegian coins have also got norse motives, and one coin has got this Urnes horse motive. I use the front part of the horse motive. Above you can see three variations of the theme.

The motive is sketched freely on the freshly sowed and still wet leather sheath. Then I work with small tools hand pressing the lines within the motive, until the motive is polished to a finish and the leather has dried.

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This set of knives was made as a wedding present for my niese Gry Nordtorp Knatterud and her husband Øystein Bakken in 1996

Left: Both knives.The knife at left is the female knife. The long knife is the male knife, the traditional Hedmark type. Blades are hand made, and both knives and sheaths are trimmed with 925 silver. The leather decorations are hand crafted.
Middle: The female knife.
Right: The traditional male knife with a hooked grip.

Old Norse motives
I love to use old norse motives.

Blue knife		Bird motive		Horse motive

Blue knife: Left: A combination of leather and birch tree and 925 silver. Leather motive: the stylized Urnes horse. The blade is damascus forged steel.
Bird motive: Knife with birch tree grip, fitted with 9000 years old bog- soaked oak. The motive on the sheath is a peacock from an old silver broch.
Horse motive: Birch tree grip, with Taxus Baccata wood. The sheath has a Urnes horse motive.

Hunting motive

1996. Sometimes I choose fun motives! Many hunters and woodsmen from Hedmark seem to like a long grip that fits the hand. Handle: birch tree, pewter and African Cocobolo. The grip lion button is 925 silver from Dixie Gunworks.

A hunting knife from 1998. Birch tree and moose antler. Bull moose head motive. 925 silver engraved button, also a moose head.