The oldest currently known Oldowan tools have been found in Gona, Ethiopia. These are dated to about 2.6 mya. New discoveries may push that date further back in time. – Wikipedia
On July 12th 2008, after two months of preparation, the first meeting of the newly founded Cape Knifemakers Guild took place at Cape Town. Nine men were present, who believed then, as they do now, that cultivation in Cape Town of one of the oldest crafts in the world depended on their effort. While much has changed in knifemaking since the early Palaeolithic era, there is also much that has not. It is the timeless ideals which the CKG seeks to re-imbue in our age of technology. Certainly these ideals are those of perfection through work, skill through learning and fellowship through generosity, applied here unstintingly in the task of achieving through handiwork a knife from blank steel of the highest order of craftsmanship.
The CKG serves knifemakers in this manner, by providing a network into which one can give and from which one can take to help improve quality, skill, and to provide opportunity for the display and sale of their wares to the public. By 2010 the planning for a resurrection of the Cape Knife Show was underway and in November of that year it was held with success. The following year saw a change of venue, increased quality, public interest, and fiscal turnover.
Today, with forty four craftsmen the Guild has more than trebled its constituents since 2008, with members as distant as Namibia, Mosselbay, Port Elizabeth and even the UK, and continues to receive applications from enthusiastic craftsmen wishing to reclaim something of the atavistic satisfaction generated through the creation of mankind’s superlative tool.
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Cape Knifemakers Guild Constitution
(click on link for a downloadable PDF file)