Escher Hone ID confirmation?

Hi everyone! I’m a rookie at this but found a few hones at an estate sale including this one. It’s an Escher box and the stone fits the box but not as long as the box so I think the missing slurry stone would have completed the length of the box. No label on the stone and it is in great shape. Box isn’t but stone is.

Hone dimensions are 4.5x1.2x.625.

I can’t find it online anywhere with this box. I assume this is the Escher since it came in the old box, but can anyone confirm that this is an Escher hone? Thanks so much.

Nice one!

I really really liked the edges my dark thuringer gave me, wish I had never parted with it

I can't say its an Escher, for sure. But it is a Dark blue, Thurigan hone.

I have one similar to yours. Its in its original box, without a slurry stone.

Attachment 334636

Thanks Mike!

Indeed an interesting hone and box.
The thuringians of this size 4.5 x 1.2 have been sold in former times mainly as penknife hones - not razor hones. Razor hones normally haven been 4.5 or 5 long but only 1'' wide. One explanation for this might be, that the typical length of a penkife blade was around 1''. But penknifes weren't honed with x-strokes but straight. So the hone must be a little wider than the blade length. Razors needed to be honed with x-strokes on this narrow hones anyway.
Here is an example of a penknife hone from my collection. Stone with same dimensions than yours, box with nearly the same description, fits exactly to the stone, not from the Escher company though:

Attachment 334796Attachment 334797

Your hone has same dimensions, but box is larger because of a slurry stone that once was included. And it was sold as razor hone as you can read on the box.
So I don't think that there is a doubt that the stone is original. Unfortunately the slurry stone is missing.

Don't think that it is really a dark blue though. Looks for me more like a blue green.

Regards Peter

Here is my collection of Thurigan, hones.

Though, not labeled. By the information I found from a Escher site, the first one on the left would be a, blue/green barbers jem. That is from their description, dimensions, and listing of their hones.

Second is a light blue, Thurigan of unknown mine/producer

Third is dark blue, Thurigan of unknown mine/producer.

Attachment 334819

Yeah that is really hard to decide Mike. It all depends on the light in which the photo was taken.
In your picture I would rate the left one as a clear yellow-green, the one in the middle is light green and the right one as blue green. But as said, in other ligth it looks different. Best is to have them in hand, then you can clearly rate them.

Regards Peter

Quote:

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Originally Posted by hatzicho

Yeah that is really hard to decide Mike. It all depends on the light in which the photo was taken.
In your picture I would rate the left one as a clear yellow-green, the one in the middle is light green and the right one as blue green. But as said, in other ligth it looks different. Best is to have them in hand, then you can clearly rate them.

Regards Peter

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Here's a few other pics of the B/G

Attachment 334823

Dry
Attachment 334824

Wet
Attachment 334825

The blue swirls are more visable, here.

Well yeah, that is a yellow-green to blue combination hone. One side is yellow-green, the other side blue. Sometimes part of the blue is breaking through the yellow green matrix. These stones are sedimentary.
But that is not a blue-green hone quality. A blue green is a unique color somewhat between the light green and the blue hones.
I will make some photos for comparison tomorrow and post them.
Regards Peter

Quote:

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Originally Posted by hatzicho

Well yeah, that is a yellow-green to blue combination hone. One side is yellow-green, the other side blue. Sometimes part of the blue is breaking through the yellow green matrix. These stones are sedimentary.
But that is not a blue-green hone quality. A blue green is a unique color somewhat between the light green and the blue hones.
I will make some photos for comparison tomorrow and post them.
Regards Peter

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That explains the inclusion on the blue side. It gives me no problems honing on it, and by far, an impeccable finisher. A flea market find, a mere $15 :rock:

Attachment 334829

Another image of the Escher (apparently) that started this thread but in outdoor natural light. Not sure of color. Pretty dark.

.
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To a collector the color, completeness of the set ( stone and slurry stone), the condition of the box, would be important. But to the rest of us the only important thing is the quality of the edge on the razor.

Here is mine i own which i can add to the post. The Boxes appeared in various colors as far as i can say it seems not that the coloration of the boxes is in any way connected to the Qualities (DB, YG, Green, light green) of the stones sold.

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/...d92628_k_d.jpg
https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/...fa745d_k_d.jpg
https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/...aab2fe_k_d.jpg

So as promissed – with a little dealy – here is a color comparrison of thuringian hones.

Normally thuringinas are classified in 4 colors: yellow-green (yg), light green (lg), blue-green (bg) and dark blue (db).
But that doesn’t mean that each color was only 1 layer of stone. As reported elsewhere here in this forum (https://sharprazorpalace.com/hones/9...-combos-7.html), in fact thuringian whetstone makers have exploited about 170 different layers within the quaries, all of more or less different color. But all of these have been classified in only the four a.m. qualities.
Also the mining of different layers have been done in different phases, beginning early 1800 and in the first decades blue stones haven’t been mined at all.

The standard quality was named ligth green and all colors from green to each shades of grey have been classified here. Most thuringians you find on the market today will be light green ones.
However two green color gamuts have been seperated.

On the lower part of the color palette there was the yellow-green. All yg-hones are more yellow than green or have at least a certain yellow hue in the stone matrix.
You can also distinguish the yg hones from the light green ones by the color of their slurry. Slurry from yg hones is alway a bit yellow, light green slurry is white. You can see this best by putting a bit of slurry on a black background.

On the other side, were green turns into blue you will find the blue-green hones. The real bluegreen color is a unique color of dark turquiose. It isn’t really easy to decide the bg from lg hones.
Later in mining, also hones with a certain change in color from green to blue were named blue-green.
Both, the yg on one side and the bg on the other side have normally been of better quality than the lg hones.The differences can be small though and you can find excellent lg hones also of better quality than some yg gor bg.

As said the mining of the blue stones began later, mainly as the other colors have been mostly exploited. The paticle size of quartz in the blue hones reach much higher maximum, therefore the hones are not as fine as the other qualities. But also here, of course exceptions are present.

Attached are typical colored stones from each quality, ranging from yg on the left to dark blue on the right.

Attachment 335281

The bluegreen is a bg-labelled Escher hone. The colors are better visible if the stones are wet:

Attachment 335282

Regards Peter