MaxMHF

For pipe smokers, especially among those who feel a strong connection to things nautical or historical, the cutty is a beloved shape,  perhaps because the shape’s roots are thought to emerge from the earliest of smoking pipes: clay tavern pipes that preceded briar pipes by almost two centuries. You see at the top of this post a rare Comoy Blue Riband Shape No. 347, a briar pipe with design elements that echo its tavern-pipe predecessor: forward cant, casting nipple, and egg-ish bowl shape.

Given how the pipe’s look seems so proximal to its clay pipe origins, one might assume that the Comoy’s 347 shape is the oldest of the cutty shapes the company made, but that’s not the case. If one examines Comoy’s 1911 catalog, one discovers that the cutty listed there on page 15, “The Cutty, Shape No. 175” has a much more modern look that resembles a canted billiard. (See catalog page below) Ironically, the more modern shape is the earliest, and the later shape more a retro take.

In the same catalog, appearing on page 18, “The Tasmanian, Shape No. 203” is listed. In subsequent Comoy catalogs, its “Tasmanian” name is dropped, and the pipe is simply called a “cutty.” Like its modern Dunhill counterparts, the Comoy 203 has a canted bowl and an oval shank. Depicted below is an unsmoked Comoy Blue Riband “Cutty” (Shape No. 203) that I acquired in May from noted New York collector, Vernon Vig.

Some pipe collectors believe that a pipe is not a proper cutty if it is missing a casting nipple, but not all clays had a casting nipple as the Dumfries Museum image at right demonstrates. The side of the bowl features a portrait of Robert Burns, after an original portrait by Alexander Nasmyth.

As I have written in many previous posts, pipe nomenclature is anything but resolved. What pipes are called and why and by whom remains a matter of lively debate if not dispute. I think it is helpful to look at a variety of pipes that have been described as cuttys by those who have made them. You see depicted below cuttys by Alex Florov, Jody Davis, Tyler Lane, Trever Talbert, and David Enrique.

Clearly, there is divergence in their design vocabulary, but there are also consistencies. So, what design features do these pipes share? Each of them feature a forward cant. With the exception of the Comoy Shape No. 203, all the pipes feature an egg-ish shaped bowl. Most of them have a proportionately longer stem than a standard pipe, especially the Florov. To accentuate the pipe’s elongated design, Florov also elongated the egg-ish shape of the bowl, endowing the shape with exaggerated tavern pipe proportions (absent the casting nipple). The Talbert pipe is actually the most modern in terms of overall proportions and lack of cant. And his Ligne Bretagne pipes, of which this is one, employ old French briar stummels. Is this an older shape? Perhaps.

As someone who values clarity and accuracy in shape nomenclature, in my own classification system I suggest the following definitions and considerations:

1) Pipes that feature casting nipples like the Jack Howell briar version depicted above may be called “tavern pipes” or “cuttys.” So, I would call the Jack Howell pipe listed below a “Tavern Pipe.”

2) Pipes that are absent casting nipples would be called “cuttys,” but not “tavern pipes.”

3) So, all tavern pipes would be cuttys but not all cuttys would be tavern pipes.