Figural Knife Collectors - Please Educate Me

[deo-pa]

The knives below recently sold on eBay for about $250 and $350, respectively. Both are metal handled Solingen knives. You guys who are into figurals please tell me what is it that makes these that valuable? Is there some inherent value there (such as rare subject matter) so that any figural guy would love to have them? Or is it more likely to be a matter of two collectors who just had to have them and drove up the price?

Dennis

[knife7knut]

Have no clue. The first one looks like it has the stamp of a French company. Can't see the other one and my German is more than a little rusty. I used to be able to stumble through Mercedes-Benz parts catalogs and that was about it. Hope someone with better linguistic skills will come along and translate it.

[Mumbleypeg]

Goins says DEPOSE marked on the blade means "registered". This one looks like it says DEPOSE'E?

As for the German, on the first one, Munchner Kindl translates to Munich Child. The second one has abbreviations for some of the the words. I'm thinking it says something like "The watch on the Rhine is faithful." It may be a German idiom, or related to some German historical or religious event. Best I can do with my rusty Deutsch.

Ken

[knife7knut]

I wonder if the merged letters HB on the left breast of the first figure mean something or are just the initials of the designer?

[deo-pa]

The HB stands for the famous brewery in Munich. See https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Staatli ... C3%BCnchen

I presume this knive is an Octoberfest souvenir or souvenir of the brewery itself. As such it sounds rather common to me and makes me even more curious as to why it was worth $250 to someone.

Dennis