quill pen

Point to Paper – Grandpa Shaved with a Straight Razor and wrote with a pencil made of slate

April 6, 2024 Kjartan Skogly Kversøy Comments 0 Comment

Grandpa Walther grew up in Eastern Norway. He shaved with a straight razor. For him, being able to sharpen a blade that could cut facial hair was the mark of a man. I often wonder about things that once were common in Norway and suddenly became alien. Many things that were in everyday use for decades, generations and centuries have become obsolete and strange. Many things that were common in my grandpa’s childhood and youth in the 1910s and 1920s are…

Nibby Sunday – A Beloved Child Has Many Names

February 25, 2024 Anders Kristiansen Comments 0 Comment

This post was originally published in Norwegian at pennenermektigere.no on April 19, 2020. Fountain pen, reservoir pen, stylo plume, stilografica, self-filling pen. Fountain pens are called many things in different languages, and etymologically some of these terms have very different origins. In this post, we take a closer look at the different words used for fountain pens around the world. The Italians call fountain pens “penna stilografica“. Elsewhere in the world, however, a stylograph is often described as a pen where the tip is a…

Point to Paper – Why did the Parish Priest Lund send a letter from Tangen on Tuesday the 18th of October 1808 to the County Physicist Arbo and City Surgeon Lundt at Bragernes?

September 2, 2023 Kjartan Skogly Kversøy Comments 0 Comment

I recently bought a stack of old Norwegian handwritten letters from a collector in Sweden. All are from the early 19th century. In this pile, there was one letter that caught mye eye. It just cried out to be investigated further. The letter is from 1808 and is written with a quill pen. Quill pens were usually cut by hand by the person writing. They were cut with a small knife, preferably a folding knife, which was specially made for the task. Folding knife in English…

Pennen er mektigere

A blog about writing instruments, writing and the power of the written word

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