Is it ivory or bone; what's the best way to tell?

not2sharp

not2sharp

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I often travel abroad and sometime I come across very good old 19th century knives. Since the importation of ivory is prohibited in the U.S. the subject often comes up. So what is the best way to tel whether we are looking at ivory rather than horn or bone?
 
I see a lot of ivory in my business. I generally test with a hot needle. Heat the needle until red hot and touch item with it. If it is ivory or bone it will smell like burned bone, if it is plastic it will melt into the item and smell like burned plastic. Hope this helps.
Marcel
 
That's a good start. Usually, I use a jewler's loop to look for a fibrous structure (for ivory), or small perforations (vessel openings) for bone. But, when a knife gets to be over 100 years old, the patina combined with normal wear makes it hard to see the surface structure.

My first though was to get a first rate very high magnification loop (currently use a 10x) with a good light source. But, I wanted to know if there where better ways to tell whether I am looking at bone or ivory.
 
All elephant ivory is not banned. If it has been certified that the animal died before before the ban or died from natural causes then it may imported. This certification process from my understanding is very explicit and thorough.

Ivory? I would just like to see some good sambar stag.....
 
Howdy There.....!
My suugestion for deciding the difference between ivory and bone is to look at it with a loop. Ivory has a grain to it almost like wood and bone does not, bone will have pores or porous surface. As said but, ivory will smell like antler when burn with a hot needle and bone have that certain order. My best way to tell is the grain structure. Good luck with your review.
"Possum"


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Thomas Clegg
 
get a peice brass, round the end smooth press it against the suspect ivory rub a small place on the handle with a little pressure if it is ivory you should see a purple to blue line. hope this helpsyou can use any thing hard and smooth
 
get a peice brass, round the end smooth press it against the suspect ivory rub a small place on the handle with a little pressure if it is ivory you should see a purple to blue line. hope this helpsyou can use any thing hard and smooth
 
If we are talking about elephant or mammoth ivory and the structure is visible it is quiet easy to tell ivory from bone. Elephant tusks grow like trees and thus have small, concentric rings which can be seen without magnification. Both elephant and mammoth/mastodon ivory have Schrager lines which cross these concentric rings. If these lines are at about 90° angle, it's elephant, if they are at 115 ° it's mammoth.

For identification of other ivories like walrus, hippo, warthog, hornbill, sperm whale, narwhale or others, which may be much more difficult, look at
http://www.uniclectica.com/conserva/ivory1.html

Hope this helped.

Achim
 
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