The Story and Art of the Crooked Knife
by Ned Jalbert

    According to the University of Massachusetts (Amherst)  Guides to Libraries , “ Standards... provide specifications, guidelines or characteristics that can be used consistently. Standards provide a common language of measurements.”  The IEEE Standards Association puts it this way,  “Standards form fundamental building blocks by establishing consistent protocols that can be universally understood and adapted.”

    When researching  Mocotaugan: The Story and Art of the Crooked Knife we visited dozens of museums, institutions and private collections. We viewed hundreds, if not thousands, of crooked knives, and it became immediately apparent that there were no universal standards of measurement or a consistent nomenclature for that matter, being applied to the crooked knife. In other words, there was  “no common language of measurements," and we found that there was no "consistent protocols ..( being ) ...universally understood and adapted." With no protocols or standards in place how could we conduct our research?  It was due to this widespread lack of standardization, that we created the standards and protocols, that are universally accepted today, for measuring, weighing and documenting all aspects of the crooked knife. In retrospect, it seems like such a fundamental miss on the part of the institutions and individuals we visited, but the fact remained that no one had taken the time to create crooked knife protocols and standards (The Average Crooked Knife )

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 Why call it Mocotaugan ?

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    In collections across North America , the crooked knife was referred to in a maddening array of names  - "basket-making knife", "bent knife", "canoe knife", "curved knife", "carver's knife", "carving tool", "crook knife", "general utility knife", "hooked knife" , "household knife", "Hudson's Bay Company knife", "kitchen knife" ,"man's knife", or simply " knife" to name a few. When our research unearthed that in 1748, the Hudson Bay Company using the Algonquin term  “Mocotaugan”  when referring to the crooked knife , we conceived that " Mocotaugan" would be an apt  universal name for the knife.  There is no doubt that more people today use the term" Mocotaugan" then 20 years ago, and we still think it appropriate as a common name, but the generally accepted term for the Eastern Woodlands one-handed draw knife remains "Crooked Knife." 

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