BERNARD LEVINE'S KNIFE LORE   NUMBER 62   SEPTEMBER 1993

     (c)1993 Bernard Levine, exclusive to the NKCA


VETERINARY CUTLERY IN 1771

     Nowadays most of the work of veterinarians can be divided 

into two broad categories: pets and livestock.  If your dog is 

injured or your cows are sick, you call the vet.  Of course when 

your transportation is on the blink nowadays, you don't go to see 

the veterinarian, you go to see a mechanic.  

     Back in the old days, by contrast, when horsepower still 

came from horses, veterinarians were as much responsible for 

keeping transport moving as they were for the health of domestic 

animals and livestock.  Indeed, throughout most of the history of 

veterinary medicine, its primary concern has been the health and 

fitness of riding animals, work animals, and draft animals -- 

horses, mules, and oxen.  

     Indeed veterinary skills were so important in the old days 

that they were not left exclusively to the professionals.  Just 

as most people today have at least some rudimentary mechanical 

skills (checking the oil, changing a tire, emptying the ashtray), 

most people in the old days had rudimentary veterinary skills -- 

although often their practices were not based on sound medical 

science.  

     Without healthy animals, farmers could not plow their fields 

or bring their produce to market.  Armies could not maneuver, 

they could not attack, and they could not move supplies and 

artillery.  Contractors could not transport lumber and stone to 

their building sites.  Noblemen could not supervise their 

domains, or travel to the royal court.  Shopkeepers could not 

deliver merchandise to customers, or receive supplies from 

factories, docks, and warehouses.  

     And just as most rural residents today own a kit of 

mechanical tools, to maintain and repair their cars, trucks, and 

tractors, most rural people in the past owned a kit of veterinary 

instruments, to help keep their four-legged prime movers moving.  

The craftsmen who made those veterinary instruments were the 

cutlers, the same people who made pocketknives, razors, kitchen 

knives, and scissors.  

     Jean Jacques Perret of Paris, the most famous cutler of the 

18th century, was no exception.  In his remarkable 1771 treatise, 

The Art of the Cutler, he describes in detail how he made every 

type of cutlery, from tiny pen knives to stout damascus swords.  

He devotes one whole chapter of this three-volume work to the 

production of Les Instruments de Marechallerie.  Here is an 

edited translation.  


                           CHAPTER 28 

                     VETERINARY INSTRUMENTS

     Ever since the celebrated establishment of the [French] 

Veterinary Schools, veterinary medicine has been acquiring new 

knowledge day by day.  It has already brought the study of the 

constitution of animals to a level that was never approached in 

classical antiquity.  

     Veterinary students have been especially enterprising in our 

century, above all thanks to encouragement from learned and 

enthusiastic patrons.  With their support, and with instruction 

from masters of the art, students are now seeking the causes of 

animals' good or bad health in the very nature of the animals 

themselves.  It is by the scientific study of Anatomy in all its 

details that students develop knowledge of the varieties of 

animal illnesses, injuries, and developmental deformities.  

     Now our veterinary students are carrying these studies so 

far forward that they are able to do many of the same operations 

on animals that surgeons do on human beings.  In such cases, many 

of the same types of instruments which are used by surgeons can 

also be used by veterinarians.  These instruments only need to be 

different in size and strength, in proportion to the shape and 

size of the animal parts on which they will be used to operate.  

In this chapter we shall detail those instruments ordinarily used 

only by veterinarians, as the making of human surgical 

instruments is covered in detail in Parts II and III of this 

work.  

     [Perret himself had attended medical school in his youth, so 

as to improve the quality and utility of his surgical 

instruments.  Many of the surgical instruments in common use 

today are little changed from the ones made by Perret 222 years 

ago.  By contrast, most of the veterinary instruments described 

below are now obsolete, especially the ones connected to 

phlebotomy, or blood-letting.]  


                    PLATE LXI (61) GOES HERE

            CUTTING INSTRUMENTS USED BY VETERINARIANS

     Figure 1 shows curved scissors, and Figure 2 shows straight 

scissors.  Now that we are advanced in our study of the cutler's 

art [this is Chapter 28], we will describe the illustrations 

without going into detail about the methods of forging, filing, 

etc., because these operations are done pretty much the same way 

as on the items we have already discussed.  

     Figure 3 [bottom row, fourth drawing from left] shows an 

operating knife or a sort of bistoury.  Its cutting edge needs to 

be a little on the stout side.  This is to say that its edge 

should not be made so fine that it will flex under pressure from 

a fingernail.  Its back is one third of an inch thick.  Its 

handle is ebony riveted to a flat tang.  

     Figure 4 [bottom row, the short knife sixth from left] is a 

true bistoury.  Its edge must be of the same degree of 

flexibility as a fine pen knife used for cutting quills.  

     Figure 5 [bottom row, fifth from left] shows a lancet with 

handles riveted to a flat tang.  Its blade is sharp on both 

sides.  These two cutting edges are separated by a median ridge 

that runs right out to the point.  This instrument, too, should 

have flexible cutting edges like a fine pen knife.  

     Figure 6 [bottom left] shows an instrument called a "sage 

leaf" because of its shape.  It too has handles riveted on to a 

flat tang.  It has two edges, separated by a median ridge.  Its 

blade is curved [see the profile view].  

     Figure 7 [bottom row, third from left] shows another "sage 

leaf" that is longer in the blade.  It is also straighter, being 

only slightly curved.  

     Figure 8 [top] shows a surgical gouge.  

     Figure 9 [bottom row, seventh from left] is a spatula on 

which the small end terminates in an "olive," so that it may 

function as a sound.  [A sound is used to probe body orifices.]  

     Figure 10 [under the scissors] shows a hollow sound [a probe 

and director].  It is used as a guide for the point of the 

bistoury in opening an abscess.  The wide part b [right] is a tab 

for holding on to the instrument.  

     Figure 11 [bottom right] shows a forceps with an errhine at 

the end.  [An errhine is any instrument or substance used to 

induce sneezing.  In this case it is a hook for tickling inside 

an animal's nose.]  

                    PLATE LXII (62) GOES HERE

     Figure 12 [Plate LXII, top right] shows a handle containing 

two hoof paring knives.  They are sharp on the sides toward the 

handle, but only along the straight part.  Since this instrument 

is used for scraping, the edge must be strong, like that of a 

straight-bladed knife.  

     This handle is made of yellow copper.  To make it one takes 

a strip of brass 9 inches long and bends it in the middle.  To 

make the space for the hooked ends of the paring blades, all you 

need to do is take a round piece of iron about two thirds of an 

inch thick and fold the handle around this improvised mandrel.  

You won't have to do any soldering.  Then you should fold the 

[head] end f over squarely on the inside, to constrain the blades 

in their rotation.  

     Figure 16 [top center] shows the side view of a hoof knife, 

and it reveals how the blade nests in the handle.  Note how the 

head end of the handle is closed, so that it will hold the blade 

rigidly while scraping hooves.  Usually one needs a two-bladed 

hoof knife, with blades going opposite ways [right hand and left 

hand], such as the one shown in Figure 12.  

     Figure 13 shows a multi-blade fleam set with seven blades 

[top row, second from left].  These blades include three 

different sized fleams, two hoof blades, a bistoury, and a 

lancet, all of them shutting up into one handle.  

     To forge a fleam, one takes pure steel about three-fourths 

of an inch wide.  In the first heat, one cuts out the shape shown 

in Figure 14 [bottom right].  After this one extends the center 

of the projection with several blows of the hammer, to elongate 

the point like a lancet blade.  

     The way blood-letting is done with this instrument is as 

follows.  The point is placed upon a major vessel.  Then one 

strikes the tang with a stick, such as a hammer handle.  For this 

reason it is important to temper a fleam carefully, and not to 

anneal the sharp part past the color of gold.  However all the 

rest must be drawn to blue, the same color as water.  Otherwise 

the fleam will shatter at the first bleeding.  

     This instrument requires a good sharpening.  However, it is 

small and awkwardly shaped.  Therefore one must equip oneself 

with a small pair of wooden tongs.  Put the fleam in these, 

fastening them to the tang with a wedge behind the pivot.  See 

Figure 15 [bottom row, second from right].  With this assistance, 

one can do the sharpening readily.  

     The fleam is sharpened on both sides, divided by a median 

ridge that blends into the point.  The faces must be ground 

briskly, and the edges must flex under the fingernail.  The 

wheel for grinding fleams must be 11 or 12 inches in diameter, 

well trued, a bit on the narrow side, and have sharp corners.  

     The handle for this multi-blade instrument is made of yellow 

copper.  If you don't want to order the whole thing cast in a 

mold by a brass-founder, here is how to make it.  Cut out two 

identical pieces of brass with the aid of a steel pattern.  Then 

join them together by soldering on a folded strip of brass which 

will serve as a guard [for the tips of the fleams], its size 

determined by the size the of fleams one wishes to include in the 

handle.  See Figure 17 [top left].  

     Note that if you are going to include hoof knives, it is 

necessary to shape a space for their curved tips, prior to 

soldering on the fleam guard.  Do this by giving a couple of 

extra hammer blows while holding the piece atop the vise, which 

is opened a fraction of an inch.  This widening is shown in 

Figure 13 [top row, second from left].  

     Figure 18 [bottom left] shows a ring-handled forceps...  

     [Here follows a lengthy explanation of how to forge this 

box-joint instrument, which I will skip over.  Figures 19-23 show 

details of this construction, which is similar to that still used 

on some forceps and hemostats today.]  



                   PLATE LXIII (63) GOES HERE

     Figure 25 [Plate LXIII, bottom left] shows a completed 

multi-blade fleam set, opened so that all the implements are 

visible.  Reading from right to left: 1 is a hoof knife; 2 is a 

large fleam; 3 is a middle-sized fleam; and 4 is a small fleam; 5 

is the bistoury; 6 is the lancet; and 7 is the case [or handle], 

into which one closes up all the blades.  

     Figure 26 [far right] shows a large Seton needle.  Its point 

ends in a slightly curved "sage leaf," and there is a median 

ridge on the upper side.  At the other end x is a hole, or "eye 

of the needle," for lodging the setaceum.  This hole is formed 

hot.  When forging the Seton needle, leave this end a bit thick.  

Then pierce it while hot with a flat punch.  Finally finish it 

with a file.  

     [Setaceum was an early form of inoculation.  A string or rag 

was soaked in the blood of a sheep or cow that had died of 

blackleg, a deadly form of animal gangrene.  The Seton needle was 

then used to thread this infected string through a fold of skin 

on a healthy animal.  Some animals died of the procedure, but 

most developed immunity to the disease.  

     Setaceum was also used on human beings, to induce the 

formation of pus.  Pus formation was long thought to be a 

necessary step in the healing process.  It was not until the 

1870s that it was recognized as a sign of avoidable infection.  A 

human Seton needle is shown on the bottom right of page 271 of 

Levine's Guide III.]  

     Figure 27 [bottom, second from right] is another smaller 

Seton needle.  

     Figure 28 [top, second from right] is a curved suturing 

(stitching) needle.  [There is no Figure 29.]  

     Figures 30, 31, and 32 are the parts of an instrument called 

a "ball-puller."  It is used to extract a musket ball that has 

struck a horse.  Often a musket ball can penetrate 14 or 15 

inches deep in a horse's flesh, and this is the reason for the 

great length of the instrument.  

     To attain this length, one forges out three thin segments, 

each one 7 inches long.  This is called "breaking" an instrument, 

to make it more portable.  The ball-puller attaches together with 

screw threads in two places.  V on part 31 screws into Q on part 

30, while S on part 32 screws into t on part 31.  

     To form the scoop on the end of part 30, one should leave 

the end thick while forging out this segment.  Then one should 

pierce that wide end halfway through with a thick round-ended 

punch.  Finally one should bend the scoop and shape the tip like 

a strawberry.  

     At the other end of the instrument, on part 32, is a hole.  

This can be used as a Seton needle, if you shape the end like a 

"sage leaf."  This end can also be used for probing a wound, to 

locate the musket ball.  

     Figure 33 [top center] shows a "German Style Fleam."  With 

this instrument one can bleed an animal by spring action, rather 

than by use of a hammer handle or blood-stick.  Its case is made 

out of copper.  The blade I D is affixed by a screw at I, but it 

is held loosely, allowing it to pivot.  The part n n is the main 

spring, which is retained by a pin at P, and by a screw at I.  

     The case is closed by means of the grooved lid, Figure 34 

[to left of Figure 33].  The bottom of the case is shown in 

Figure 37 [to right of Figure 33; there is no Figure 35].  This 

part holds the lever which serves to compress the spring, and to 

latch it in the cocked position by means of a stud at o, until 

one is ready to activate the fleam.  This is done by pressing the 

lever at q [the scallop shell near the center of the handle] with 

one's fingertip.  This will release the blade with as much force 

as the hammer of a rifle.  

     Figure 36 [bottom, third from right] shows a side view of 

the lever removed from the case.  One can see that it has a 

return spring, affixed by a rivet at B.  One can also note the 

pivot [the blank section in the center].  The stud, which retains 

the spring, is shown here at a.  

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