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The Four Horsemen of the Sabatier & Monsieur Dulac

October 16, 2026 – Josh Donald

We’re all familiar with the brand names that have become shorthand for their type of product. Band-Aid, Kleenex, Coke. Aside from the Swiss Army knife or Buck knife, the only culinary knife to have become eponymous is the Sabatier—perhaps less so these days as other knives have eclipsed their ubiquity in professional kitchens. We get customers coming in asking for a “French knife” as in chef knife, but “Sabatier” still is the stand-in for a French-made knife, though many venerable French makers did not operate under a Sabatier brand name.

French knives do have a distinct design and history that would get them identified by many older cooks as a “Sabatier” regardless of the maker’s name. There are four main knife patterns that have defined French culinary knives, and through them we can trace the evolution of Thiers’s industrial history: the plate semelle, cuisine massive, Canadian, and Idéal.

Intro: French Chef Knives of the Past Few Centuries

Early in the 19th century, French chef knives were typified by the ‘cuisine massive’ (AKA ‘Nogent style’), and its less-well-heeled but still-venerable counterpart, the ‘plate semelle’. This ‘flat plate’ style work knife was flat-forged, typically inexpensive, and fitted with a wood, horn, or bone handle. The simple flat-forging of a plate semelle goes back a very long way, and it is thus difficult to date a knife from that alone. Similarly, while the stick tang of the Cuisine Massive is a more advanced technique to forge and grind, this style of knife dates back to the Renaissance and even a bit earlier. The late 19th-century Canadian and early 20th-century Idéal patterns are much easier to date, as they are directly tied to the industrial development of the drop forge.

Plate semelle, cuisine massive, Canadian, and Idéal pattern chef knives side by side — L–R: Plate semelle, cuisine massive, Canadian, and Idéal pattern chef knives. Photo by Bernal Cutlery, 2026.

I. Plate Semelle: Pre-Renaissance–1960s

Plate semelle knives represent a very old forging technique. Originally, they were made by forging out steel to form the blade, and then forge-welding a softer, lower-carbon steel or iron tang to form the handle. This saved steel and made it easier to drill holes through the handle and into the tang. The tang is also forged thinner and longer, creating a tapered blade and tang with a thick area where the two meet. Later in the 20th century, as steel became cheaper and easier to come by, knives were forged entirely from steel; eventually, these gave way to blanked, non-forged blades, especially as steel quality improved and mechanization increased.

The nearly ubiquitous bolster on Western culinary knives has its origin from the bulge of steel where the blade and tang meet on a plate semelle forged knife. On a simple knife, this bulge is forged down a bit, but if left larger, decorative grinding can be added as an embellishment. During the Middle Ages, fine cutlery offered at noble and church banquets was an important mark of wealth and power. Ornate handles and ornamental grinding became emblematic of fine cutlery. It lives on today in the more subdued, less ornate bolsters that characterize Western culinary knives and are seen as indications of fine cutlery.

Spine view of a knife bolster — Proto-bolster on an old English knife. Photo by Bernal Cutlery, 2026.

The forged plate semelle was replaced by knives blanked or stamped from sheet steel as the old hand-forging hammers were phased out. The last forged plate semelles seem to date to the 1950s, possibly the ’60s. Often our best clue is the rivets: compression, or cutler’s, rivets replaced the older pin-and-disc rosette rivets by the 1960s.

Plate semelle chef knife with old-style rosette rivets — Plate semelle with old-style rosette rivets. Photo/diagram by Bernal Cutlery, 2026.

Spine view of the plate semelle chef knife — Visibly tapering junction where the blade and tang of the plate semelle would be joined. Photo by Bernal Cutlery, 2026.

II. Cuisine Massive (AKA Nogent style) 18th Century & older–decline of traditional manufacture in 1980s; modern iteration in existence

The cuisine massive (AKA Nogent style) knife earned Thiers its worldwide fame in the late 19th century (but with much deeper roots) and arguably became the world’s first eponymous “Sabatier” knife. The ‘cuisine massive’ or ‘Nogent style’ chef knife featured a forged, thin-ground triangular blade with a narrow bolster at the heel and a thin-forged rat tail tang, fitted with a one-piece wood handle and a tubular ferrule ring at the collar, secured with cutler’s cement.

Cuisine massive, or Nogent style, chef knife — Cuisine massive / “Nogent style” chef knife. Photo/diagram by Bernal Cutlery, 2026.

Spine view of the cuisine massive chef knife — Tubular ring ferrule and one-piece handle that covers the rat tail tang of the cuisine massive design of knife. Photo by Bernal Cutlery, 2026.

Ebony or other tropical hardwoods were the top-shelf offering, with domestic or local woods fitted to slightly less expensive models. Beech or fruit woods were often used, and to give them the look of higher-end ebony handles, they were darkened or ‘ebonized’ with an iron gall ink made from oak galls and ferrous sulfate. Iron gall ink is a waterproof ink developed in 5th-century Europe and used for documents, manuscripts, Leonardo da Vinci’s drawings, and dyeing wood and leather. Iron gall ink was the standard well into the 20th century, when it was replaced by more permanent synthetic inks, but it was still used on wood-handled cutlery well into the 1960s and 70s.

So, why two names for this knife? When I first visited Thiers and referred to ‘Nogent-style’ knives, I could tell I made some old-timers uncomfortable. They corrected me away from the name ‘Nogent’ towards ‘cuisine massive’. Not all of these knives seemed so massive, and in fact they were often way lighter than their full-tang, fully forged younger French cousins. What gives?

Many of the maker’s marks found on these included the name of the town Nogent, but many others were marked Paris, Châtellerault, or makers easily connected to Thiers, where the bulk of these were made for the longest period. Apparently the rival town of Nogent adopted this style of chef knife manufacture from Thiers and has no real claim to them—so the Thiernois say. I was informed that Nogent was more a center for scissors and less for chef knives and working knives until the 20th century. Americans’ insistence on using the term ‘Nogent’ for these knives still persists and, while not friendly to the Thiernois ear, seems here to stay.

Interlude: A Quick Sidebar About Drop Forging

The multi-ton blows of the dies on the hammer and anvil of a drop forge can rough-form a knife blade much faster than drawing out a knife blade from a bar of steel on the smaller, older martinet mechanical hammers. These new machines were powerful, but lacked the finesse required for the later steps in knifemaking. Drop-forged knife blanks still required the work of skilled smiths at the martinet mechanical hammer to draw out the blades and tangs, and the combined technique was used in all knifemaking centers adopting drop forges. In Thiers, this practice continued well into the latter part of the 20th century, past its abandonment in other knifemaking areas of Europe and the United States, it seems.

A modern drop forge in Thiers — Modern drop forge in Thiers. Photo by Josh Donald of Bernal Cutlery.

III. Canadian: 1870s–(Sort of) Present

The Canadian pattern was born in late 19th century Thiers when they adopted the industrial drop forge, likely due to pressure from the aforementioned upstart knifemaking town of Nogent, which had recently increased its own output by adopting the drop forge. Knifemakers in Thiers had been using a smaller hand-operated rope-and-pulley drop forge for folding knife blades, but adding the drop forge in the mid-19th century greatly sped up forging production and encouraged new designs.

Adding a full-tang handle to the short-bolstered triangular cuisine massive pattern blade birthed the ‘Canadian’. This is very similar to the standard German-style chef knife today, although the old Canadian has a much narrower bolster.

Canadian pattern chef knife — Canadian knife pattern. Photo/diagram by Bernal Cutlery, 2026.

Spine view of the Canadian pattern chef knife — Integrally forged bolster with no ferrule ring on the Canadian knife design. Photo by Bernal Cutlery, 2026.

IV. Idéal: 1920s–Present

Thiers made another defining contribution to knife design right after WW1, with the birth of the now quintessential French chef knife, the ‘Idéal’. In the 1920s, Thiers factories switched from water power from the Durolle River to electric power. At one of these newly upgraded factories, a Monsieur Dulac made an important innovation at his drop forge when he blended the full tang and integral bolster of the Canadian pattern with the secondary applied ferrule ring of the cuisine massive / Nogent style and created the now iconic Idéal pattern that included an integrally forged ferrule ring / bolster to a flat full tang chef knife.

Idéal pattern chef knife — Idéal knife pattern. Photo/diagram by Bernal Cutlery, 2026.

Spine view of the Idéal pattern chef knife — Integrally forged bolster and ferrule ring of the Idéal knife design. Photo by Bernal Cutlery, 2026.

Dulac did not patent his development, and before long, not only did all the other Thiers makers make an Idéal pattern knife in their lineup, but so did many makers outside of France; it was immensely popular and influential, likely because of the great influence of French cuisine worldwide in the 1920s. J.A. Henckels, in their 1930 catalog, even included a ‘Sabatier pattern’ in the Idéal form. This is now the iconic French chef knife, having really taken off after the middle of the 20th century, and while arguably Germanized versions of the ‘Canadian’ are still in large production in Thiers, the Idéal is the champ. Thank you, Monsieur Dulac.

K Sabatier × Bernal Cutlery Nouvel Ideal: 2025–?

Over the years, we have had a number of people ask if we can grind off the bolster from French chef knives to help facilitate sharpening and easier access to fine work in a thinned-out heel. Sometimes this seemed like a reasonable request, but one that I had no elegant way to execute on the grinder. Other times, it seemed absolutely sacrilegious to desecrate an old knife that had made its way to us from up to a dozen or more decades.

Buildings along the Durolle River in Thiers, France. Photo by Bernal Cutlery.

On a trip to Thiers several years ago, a discussion with several generations of the Bournilhas family of K Sabatier fame brought the idea of an updated version of the Idéal without the full bolster extending to the heel and with an iconic deep colored palissander wood and brass handle.

K Sabatier × Bernal Cutlery Nouvel Ideal pattern chef knife — K Sabatier × Bernal Cutlery Nouvel Ideal pattern. Photo/diagram by Bernal Cutlery, 2026.

Spine view of the Nouvel Ideal pattern chef knife — Nouvel Ideal is bolsterless by design, but features an integrally forged ferrule. Photo by Bernal Cutlery, 2026.

Initially, in the spirit of the 1920s, our new Idéal line, christened “Nouvel Ideal,” was only carbon steel, but we added a few in stainless as we got a lot of requests for it. Why not? Stainless was on the scene in the 1920s, technically (but not nearly as good as it is today).

Carbon steel Nouvel Ideal collection. Photo by Molly DeCoudreaux for Bernal Cutlery, 2025.

Nouvel Ideal series knives are drop-forged from a single bar of carbon or stainless steel and are hand-ground extra-thin behind the edge for an excellent cutting feel. They are easy to sharpen and have good toughness, making them a great all-around workhorse. As students of history and champions of Thiers knifemaking both past and present, we are proud to make our small contribution to this legacy.