19th century corvo for discussion

[Ian]

Originally Posted by Sajen

A theory concerning the age of the different corvos.

I've searched through old threads here and have seen that the ones which look fairly old and rustic worked has the tang in up, speak near the spine of the blade, see the attached pictures, all taken from old threads and two own examples.

Hi Detlef:

You might be interested in the link posted some time back by Carlos, entitled: "EL CORVO CHILENO: HERRAMIENTA, ARMA Y SÍMBOLO HISTÓRICO" on the blog site URBATORIUM

Written in Spanish, it traces the history of the corvo and its relationship to agricultural tools and weapons of the past. My Spanish is rudimentary only so I won't attempt any translation. However, it would be helpful if someone here might translate it into English for us. I have attached a museum picture from that site that shows corvos from the War of the Pacific (dated 1880), including several general purpose examples. The pictures show that the dorsal- and central-oriented tangs, and the two types of bolsters you describe, were coexistent at the time of the War of the Pacific. It's possible that central tangs are more common today but they don't seem to have originated more recently than the dorsal tangs.

With regard to the origin of the word "corvo" for this knife, it has been well established in several posts here that it derives from the Spanish word for "curve," and has nothing to do with a crow (Corvid) which happens to share a common etymological root from Latin. Fernando has pointed this out several times, but the "crow theory" keeps coming back.

Corvos de la Guerra Del Pacifico (Collecion de Marcello Vilalba Solanas)