Picked up a vintage Trompette, Henckels and another unknown French knife

[Tag302]

I just picked up these 4 knives.
My journey into knives started only recently and I have quickly found that old carbon is my weakness... I went in a bit of a shopping spree on ebay.... lol.

I have no clue what the bottom one is. It has a stamp I am not familiar with.
But second from the bottom is a Medaille d’or La Trompette. It looks like the handle might be original since it has the hole from the tang being peened over the end. The tip is super flexible and the knife is super light. Idk if I am going to keep it, but I like how light it is compared to my other knives.
The second from the top is a Henckels 108-10”. I don’t know what I am going to do with it yet, it is a lot rougher than I originally thought.
The top one I got just to practice sharpening. It has no branding but took a pretty good edge (my sharpening skills are pretty shoddy). It will probably replace my similarly sized dexter since this one has a whole lot more life left in it.
Any ideas for what should be done with the bottom three?

 

[McMan]

If you've got some time on your hands, hang onto the Sabs... They're not getting any easier to find. And those are the nice old nogent ones with the thin bolster. ~100yrs old. That steel sings and takes a very nice edge.

 

[Tag302]

Thanks for the advice. I’m not really confident enough in my sharpening skills yet to want to try and somewhat valuable 100year old knife...
Though I am more likely to keep the the Trompette than the other unknown one.

 

[Southpaw]

C’mon! No politics!

oh wait it’s a Trompette

 

[Ericfg]

That top one's very nice and in great shape. I'd just give it a good cleaning and maybe fix up/sand down the handle a bit.
Love that old Henckels. I got one very similar recently (look up my 'Holy Toledo' thread). Yours looks like it's got a fairly significant concave edge to it. Those take a lot of work to fix without power tools. If it were mine I might consider shortening the blade down to a more usable 8 inch length. That might make fixing the edge easier.

 

[Benuser]

I guess the Trompette was originally a much longer one before an accident occurred where the tip got broken off. Profile is far from common.

 

[Benuser]

As for the bottom one: I don't recognise the mark, but there were hundreds of it. Couteliers Thiers
In fact, it doesn't matter that much by which workshop the blade was finished. Quality fluctuations were large, and steel sourcing could differ according to the vagaries of peace and war.
You only find out when sharpening, and even than, with vintages, it's perfectly common to see blades that have been oversteeled, or overheated by mechanical sharpening. In those cases the real quality only appears once quite an amount of fatigued steel got removed.
So, give it a fair chance.

 

[Tag302]

As for the bottom one: I don't recognise the mark, but there where hundreds of it. Couteliers Thiers
In fact, it doesn't matter that much by which workshop the blade was finished. Quality fluctuations were large, and steel sourcing could differ according to the vagaries of peace and war.
You only find out when sharpening, and even than, with vintages, it's perfectly common to see blades that have been oversteeled, or overheated by mechanical sharpening. In those cases the real quality only appears once quite an amount of fatigued steel got removed.
So, give it a fair chance.

Thanks for those tips. I’m gunna practice some more on sharpening before I attempt this Trompette, but I’m excited to see how it turns out!

 

[cotedupy]

Ooh nice!

I'd be pretty sure, as Benuser said, that the Trompette has had its profile changed, but I kinda like it. Will look good when you take some of the heel off.