Wee pen knife

Subject: RE: Wee pen knife
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 03 Nov 04 - 05:08 PM

A pen knife is exactly what it says, a knife for sharpening goose quills so that they could be used as a pen. It was not the folding pen knife we now know, which is a development of the original.
Giok

Subject: RE: Wee pen knife
From: Joybell
Date: 03 Nov 04 - 04:51 PM

It's often "ground long and sharp" as in "Lord Thomas and Fair Ellender"/"The Brown Girl" so that it becomes a modified weapon. Joy

Subject: RE: Wee pen knife
From: Phil Cooper
Date: 03 Nov 04 - 04:05 PM

I believe that at the time these ballads were written, that a pen knife was actually carried to cut food and had a longer blade than what we now call a pen knife. If someone was carrying a sword, along with a dagger down the sock, the shorter bladed knife on the belt would seem smaller than it might now. My singing partner Margaret points out that the blade of a "wee pen knife" was probably long enough to be considerd illegal in most cities these days.

Subject: RE: Wee pen knife
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 03 Nov 04 - 03:11 PM

She took a pen-knife long and sharp
Oh the rose and the linsey oh
She pierced that bonny babe to the heart
Down by the greenwood sidey oh.

Giok

Subject: RE: Wee pen knife
From: Lighter
Date: 03 Nov 04 - 03:04 PM

A pen-knife in use wouldn't be restricted to trimming quills. Like a Swiss Army knife, a small knife (originally carried in a sheath rather than folded up like a SWK) would be handy for all sorts of things.

I'm guessing, but pen-knives may have been larger in the distant past than they are today. A modern-day butter knife, for example,is pretty "wee" compared to a hunting or butcher knife.

Subject: RE: Wee pen knife
From: Dave Sutherland
Date: 03 Nov 04 - 03:03 PM

In Child Owlett;-
"Lady Eskine took her wee penknife,
Which lay doon by the bed,
And pricked herself below the breast,
Which made her body bleed"

Subject: RE: Wee pen knife
From: masato sakurai
Date: 03 Nov 04 - 11:18 AM

According to A Concordance to the Child Ballads, "penknife" is used in 52 times, "pen-knife" 47 (total 99) in the Child ballads. Many are preceded by "little" or "wee."

Subject: RE: Wee pen knife
From: Roberto
Date: 03 Nov 04 - 10:48 AM

Another couple of ballads complete with a little pen knife: Babylon, or The Bonnie Banks of Fordie (Child #14); Young Hunting (#68). R

Subject: RE: Wee pen knife
From: Rain Dog
Date: 03 Nov 04 - 10:46 AM

Dave

You have the Gaul to correct my spelling ?

Subject: RE: Wee pen knife
From: Scabby Douglas
Date: 03 Nov 04 - 10:35 AM

I meant to say for example, "The Cruel Mother"...

Subject: RE: Wee pen knife
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 03 Nov 04 - 10:33 AM

Or even one with an asterisk!

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: Wee pen knife
From: Scabby Douglas
Date: 03 Nov 04 - 10:33 AM

"wee pen knife" or "little pen knife"
occur in numerous songs - "The Cruel Mother".

I can't help feeling that it's unlikely to have been transformed in *all* variants of songs into "wee pen knife" from "weapon knife".

In any case, I rather suspect that the point of describing it as a "pen knife" is to emphasise that it is not an offensive weapon but a small and not-usually-dangerous utensil.

I think that "pocket knife" occurs in other songs.

Other opinions

Thankfully, I am unburdened by having to change knife to kn*fe.

Subject: RE: Wee pen knife
From: Rain Dog
Date: 03 Nov 04 - 10:30 AM

Wee pen kn*fe

Any sort of kn*fe can be used as a weapon. Even one with an asterix

Subject: Wee pen knife
From: Davetnova
Date: 03 Nov 04 - 10:24 AM

In one of the singing threads this morning Yorkshire Yankee made a reference to a wee pen kn*fe in a song only making sense when it was actually a weapon kn*fe.
The only song I can think of with a wee pen kn*fe is Dick Gaughan's the Cruel Brother where brother John cuts the saddle straps with "his wee pen kn*fe". Now this always made perfect sense to me. A noble could well be literate and carry a small sharp pen kn*fe for cutting/dressing quills and it would be the perfect instrument for surruptitious cutting. But now I'm wondering, WEE PEN KN*FE or WEAPON KN*FE?
Any body know? (the * replaces i as this school censoring software counts up the kn*fes and concludes I'm a terrorist)