Mes met hoornen heft met ovale doorsnede en op achterzijde een roos c. 1590 - 1596

This is a knife with a horn handle and an oval cross-section, crafted by an anonymous artist and held in the Rijksmuseum. Embedded on its back, the rose motif. The rose, a symbol of secrecy and silence, a visual echo of the expression 'sub rosa,' meaning 'under the rose,' harkens back to ancient times. We find it adorning confessionals, ceilings, emblems of groups sworn to secrecy. Imagine it reappearing in medieval tapestries, in coats of arms of families, each time subtly shifting, yet rooted in the same deep earth of human understanding. The knife itself, a tool, a weapon, a reflection of humanity’s complex relationship with survival and aggression. Its form remains consistent through epochs, yet its meaning is ever in flux. In the hands of a surgeon, it heals; in the hands of an assassin, it destroys. Like the rose, the knife is a symbol that continues to cut through time.