The clip point is one of the three most common knife blade shapes used (the others being the drop point

Drop point

Drop point is a knife blade that slopes on the spine of the blade from the handle of the knife to the tip of the blade. This allows the spine of the blade to continue forward to the tip of the blade....

 and the spear point). Clip point blades have the appearance of having the forward third of the blade "clipped" off. The clip itself can be straight or concave.

Description

Traditionally, the spine or unsharpened edge of the knife begins at the hilt and continues to a point between one third to one fourth of the blade length. The blade spine then tapers in thickness in either a straight line or a recurve to the knife's point, which may be located above, below, or in line with the central axis of the blade. The thinned false edge of the clip may be sharpened to form a true second cutting edge. If the false edge is sharpened it increases the knife's effectiveness in piercing.

History

The clip point blade design dates back to at least Macedonian times, where examples of knapped flint clip point knives from the Eneolytic

Copper Age

The Chalcolithic |stone]]") period or Copper Age, also known as the Eneolithic/Æneolithic , is a phase of the Bronze Age in which the addition of tin to copper to form bronze during smelting remained yet unknown by the metallurgists of the times...

 period have been unearthed at the estruary of Drim

Black Drin

The Black Drin is a river in Albania and the Republic of Macedonia. It flows out of Lake Ohrid in Struga, Macedonia. After approximately it crosses the border to Albania, west of Debar. It merges with the White Drin in Kukës to form the Drin, which flows into the Adriatic Sea...

. Variants include the California clip, which uses a clip greatly extended in length, and the Turkish clip point with its extreme recurve. One of the most recognizable clip-point blades is used on the famous Bowie knife

Bowie knife

A Bowie knife is a pattern of fixed-blade fighting knife first popularized by Colonel James "Jim" Bowie in the early 19th Century. Since the first incarnation was created by James Black, the Bowie knife has come to incorporate several recognizable and characteristic design features, although its...

.

Characteristics

The clip point style allows a quicker, and thus deeper, puncture upon insertion (clip point knives being thinner at the spine). The drop point

Drop point

Drop point is a knife blade that slopes on the spine of the blade from the handle of the knife to the tip of the blade. This allows the spine of the blade to continue forward to the tip of the blade....

 has a slightly slower insertion due to its thicker spine near the tip. The drop point knife allows for more control when cutting, has a slower withdrawal time, and better negotiates "drawn out" (carving like) operations. The clip point lends itself to a quicker "stabbing" advantage with less drag during insertion and faster withdrawal. Compared to the drop point design, the clip point has a narrower and comparatively weaker tip. The clip point is also weaker than the spear point, and for this reason the latter is favored for most thrusting knives, such as the dagger

Dagger

A dagger is a fighting knife with a sharp point designed or capable of being used as a thrusting or stabbing weapon. The design dates to human prehistory, and daggers have been used throughout human experience to the modern day in close combat confrontations...

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