How does a Bowie differ from other large knives?

[zimmerstutzen]

Wicke's beautiful knife got me to wondering what is the difference between a Bowie and other large knives. I have a rather stout 15 inch blade knife that looks every bit like a french chef knife on steroids.

I also have an extremely thick bladed knife that sort of comes in between a Bowie and a machete. I got it from a florida old timer who grew up in a family of plume hunters in the Everglades. He was already in his 90's in 1977 when I got the knife. The stock is almost a quarter inch thick just about an inch above the sharp blade and then narrows down to an eighth inch thick along the back of the blade. Sort of the opposite of normal. I can chop wood with the thing.

 

[Rifleman1776]

There are many versions of what the original Bowie knife looked like. Today, almost any big knife is called a 'bowie'. Yours looks like a 'kinda', 'sorta', 'almost but not quite', 'something like' a Bowie.
Personally, I would say no. Clip does not come back far enough and doesn't look sharpened. No protective guard, etc.
Interesting big knife though.
That antler grip looks dried out. You might want to soak it in mineral oil for a month or so.

 

A Bowie, to my understanding, is more of a blade style than anything. They don't necessarily have to be big. The knife you have looks more like something made to chop through the glades, or other overgrown underbrush. A homemade machete.
Mark

 

[Claude Mathis]

Yours looks like a 'kinda', 'sorta', 'almost but not quite', 'something like' a Bowie.

It looks like a typical butcher blade to me, nothing like a Bowie.

 

[LRB]

There is no real definition of a Bowie knife. Not all Bowies have clipped points, and not all have guards. Nor do they have to be large. There are even spear point Bowies, and folding Bowies. One of the finest examples is the Searles Bowie with a straight back just as the original, if we can believe it's designer, Rezin Bowie. In that time period, Bowie knife became a term often given to any large knife. Now then, a large knife with a clipped point, double quillon guard, and false edge from that time and geography, is a Bowie knife, but none of those features were new to history. Nor were brass backed blades. The subject of definition in this case, might be compared to the difference between nude art, and pornography. Most of us know the difference when we see it, but cannot acually define what separates the two in many cases. One persons idea of art, may be pornography to another.

 

[yadkin]

The Arkansas Toothpick was a large knife with a thick blade or areenforced top it was used as a fencing foil and the knife was held with sharp edge up, when your enemy thrusted the heavy top of the blade was used to block then you thrust the knife into your asailant and pull up. Bowie knifes came in all shapes and sizes like said but as far as I know there was no standard but I could be wrong and someone here with more knowledge than myself I hope will login and shead more light on the subject.

 

[Rifleman1776]

Bowie with a straight back just as the original, if we can believe it's designer, Rezin Bowie.

James Bowie designed his own first knife. He carved the design from wood and presented it to James Black, the blacksmith/knife maker. Black modified it slightly mainly by sharpening the top clip. Bowie preferred Black's modified version and gave the go-ahead to make it that way.
Their spirits remain in Black's shop at Old Washington, Arkansas and that is what they told me when I visited there.

 

[LRB]

Sorry Rifleman, but that just doesn't have any resemblance to real history. Sounds more like the Hollywood version of history, which while enjoyable, lacks greatly in facts.

 

[Billnpatti]

Amazingly, real history differs signifacantly from Hollywood. At some point in time, Jim Bowie was given or acquired a large fixed blade knife that he carried in his sash. Just where the knife originated is not known for certain. The most likely source was his brother Rezin Bowie. Much beyond saying that it had a long fixed blade goes beyond what is known accurately by history. Later, many knife makers began making various designs of long bladed knives and calling them Bowie knives. The actual knife that Jim bowie had disappeared after the battle of the Alamo and was most likely picked up as a war souvineer by a Mexican soldier and taken back to Mexico. It is doubtful if we will ever know what it actually looked like. So, what is a Bowie knife? I guess you could say, it is any long fixed blade knife that you want to call a Bowie knife.

Stories may differ but this is what can be historically substantuated.

 

[50cal.cliff]

Oh, boy, mention Bowie and the origin and you just blew the lid of a big can of worms. Lots of info out there and sorting through the fact and fiction is not easy. As over the years they have become quite blended!

Bowie, in the past and present has came to incubus a wide variety of knives.

When you really sit down and look for documentation on the subject there is little still in existence!

There is some however that have become accepted
over the years as quite possibly the real McCoy so to speak but even with them there are some things that just do not always ring true.

I have seen this discussion before and I have seen it get nasty! I will tell you this Wick is one of the most knowledgeable with facts on this subject that I have ever talked too.

They always say that a Bowie was a fighting knife. There is one Bowie that to me, never made sense until it was explained. It looks like a crude redemption of a Bowie.

Check out this site and this image of a Bowie. It has the coffin shaped handle said to be a design feature but the angle of the blade has always made wonder what was going on with it!

Now look at it this way. Like has already been mentioned. You would use the other way over, thrust in and rip upward and your battle is done.

 

[Rifleman1776]

Oh, boy, mention Bowie and the origin and you just blew the lid of a big can of worms.

Amen, Bro.

LRB is just plain wrong. But he is from Florida so I can let it slide. :wink:
The Carrigan you show may very well have been designed after Rezin sliced his hand while pig sticking. Although, I'll acknowledge, many believe that to be the original Bowie design.
Which knife Jim took to the Alamo is a mystery. Was it #1, or #2 or some further iteration? Not know but widely speculated.
I invite anyone, even Floridians, to vist our Historical Arkansas Museum (affectionately known as HAM) to see one of the finest knife displays anywhere as well as in depth history of the Bowie.
And (brag time) one I donated. http://www.historicarkansas.org/collections/knives.aspx?id=147

 

[50cal.cliff]

Oh, but us Floridians were talking about Bowies not to infernal Arkansas toothpicks. :stir: :rotf: :rotf:

In all seriousness I think the definition for a Bowie over the years has been demeaned down the state "of a big knife"

Heck when folks started out needing knives they had a choice of something along military lines or something they had on the table for cutting up their meat. Take a look at many knives and they don't differ all that much from what was used on the table.

A good butcher knife can do a lot of chores after all and as it is resharpened constantly the shape changes. Is it what I think of when the word Bowie pops up? No but I am not sure the true Bowie can be specified anymore. However I got a butcher knife here that can take on man and beast and it belonged to my wife's Grandpa!

Sheffield made a fortune then and now knocking off copies of something the Americans called a Bowie! :yakyak: :hmm:

 

[jamesthomas]

Nice! What amazes me is the popularity of the coffin shaped handle, I've held some but they always felt kinda strange to me. I like a regular stag handle with a cross guard so the hand does'nt slip an get cut on the blade.

 

[Captjoel]

An interesting subject and a lot of tall tales have evolved around the knife carried by Jim Bowie. Many years ago I heard a story regarding the "original" knife he carried. It had been made using a piece of a meteorite and had a natural balance like no other. I never did ever dig up any such source for this tale but can't seem to forget it either. I enjoy looking at the old knives found on Norm Fladermans web site. I do get a good dose of sticker shock at the asking prices.......wow! There is a photo of one of J. Bowie's own knive's he'd given to a friend in one of the R.L. Wilson books. Steel Canvas, I believe. The knife looks like one of my very plain Case butcher knives.

 

[Rifleman1776]

Nice! What amazes me is the popularity of the coffin shaped handle, I've held some but they always felt kinda strange to me. I like a regular stag handle with a cross guard so the hand does'nt slip an get cut on the blade.

I think the uniqueness of the coffin handle is what makes it so endearing. It has almost become a symbol of Arkansas. Incorrect, IMHO, since the original Bowie was really a lot more.....uh....Bowie-like.
There are just too many versions of the story and knife design for this debate to ever end.
And, for the record, I'm not faulting our Florida friend, LRB, for his philosophy on what the origianl Bowie looked like or how it came about. There are many who agree with him. And, there are just as many who don't.

 

[50cal.cliff]

How's that ole saying go Rifleman about "always be careful when poking around with a stick, cause that stick has two ends and you can get poked with either one of them"! :idunno: :rotf: :rotf:

Look I don't take nothing too serious anymore except my relationship with God. So some might say I am thick skinned and some might say........... aw who cares what they might say! :blah: :rotf: :rotf: :rotf:


Personally I have a vision of what I consider to fall in the class of the Bowie but to describe that sometimes is hard.
A Bowie to me is a knife that was more intended for heavy use, fighting, protection, conflict, and in a pinch a great butcher knife.

I would be willing to say this though, back in the day I seriously doubt that would have been the only knife carried by the man that would have carried a Bowie!

Stop and think about it the mere size and shape of the knife renders it, not necessarily the first choice for most uses.

So I am betting that a Mountain Man or trapper or trader would have carried at least one or two more that were smaller and more suited for purposes that he would have needed when he wasn't fighting for his life! And after all you can never have too many guns or too many knives! :grin:

So back to the question how does a Bowie differ from other large knives. The main thing to me is the shape when I think of a Bowie I think of this concept. When you really stop to look at the makeup of a Bowie I would say a heavy long blade, often with a clip point and usually thought of with a guard! However that concept has been stretched in all directions. As too what the original looked like, well like I said that has been stretched in all directions, as well!

Never seen a good tale that didn't take on a new shine with every spinning of the yarn!

 

[Rifleman1776]

I mainly checked back in this thread today in hopes I have not made an enemy of Wick Ellerbe. His knives are incredible. My statements were concilliatory and acknowledges huge gaps in areas of agreement among serious Bowie students. I have read, at least, three versions of how the original Bowie design came into existance. The one with the wooden knife seems most plausible to me. Bill Worthen, curator of the Historic Arkansas Museum, is considered one of the most knowledgable students of the subject anywhere. But, he has numerous detractors.
So, LRB, ye have the big knife. I'm staying off the sandbar. :surrender:

 

I have read, at least, three versions of how the original Bowie design came into existance. The one with the wooden knife seems most plausible to me.

When people pass on what "sounds good" to them as fact, the truth gets lost. IMO

 

[LRB]

Put yer flag away Rifleman. I ain't gunna shoot. A man has the right to believe as he wants. Right, or wrong.
:v

 

[zimmerstutzen]

Captjoel, the story about a meteorite was included in an old black and white movie that I remember seeing decades ago. The old 1950's TV show started with an episode about the creation of the knife and did not have anything about "alien metal" in it. I think the TV series did the wooden model story. They attributed the brass back blade to the knife smith.

That of course is all mass media screen writer stuff.

Back in the early to mid 1960's I was given a 6 oz solid metal alledged meteorite. I remember asking my Dad if a smith could make a Bowie knife from the meteorite.