New Old Stock Pino Extra 6" Chef Knife Carbon Beech Wood & Brass Handle Maniago, Italy ~1950s 60s

New old stock Pino Extra 6" chef knife made in Maniago, Italy, most likely in the 1950s or 60s. Blade is hand-forged, hand-ground carbon steel, and the 1/2 tang handle is hafted in beech wood with a pin-and-disc rosette rivet and brass ferrule ring. 

These are part of a batch of unused vintage Italian knives we have found and are very unusual to come by, these were not exported to the United States very much and show up used hardly ever. I can count on one hand the number of vintage Italian knives of this era I have found in 20 years of dealing in vintage knives.

This is a great example of historic small-industry knife-making from several small towns in Northern Italy. Like French knives of this basic construction, they were made to be affordable work knives in their day; little vanity was paid to the finish, but they have a lot of charm.

The blade is somewhat thick behind the edge, not a super thin delicate work kind of knife, it was more fully finish ground than the other NOS Italian knives it was found with but there are some irregularities to the blade, which make this a bit difficult to get laser straight and free of small undulations of the face, but nothing like it is made today. A few handles have some old holes from insects but are 100% free of any critters.