Do you have a link?
There are two lions running around. One is a sort of traditonal Thiers or Bellevue (I forget which) Sabatier, "Mexeur Lion Sabatier" (actually Rousselon et Freres) who has a rep for "just okay" knives. The marque itself is an oldie, registered in the early 19th C, but Rousselon has only been around for around 20 years. The logo itself is a lion standing (in the usual way) on his four feet. I don't know if the handles are marked or not. I have no personal familiarity with them, but in the greater scheme of carbon Sabatier gossip, these are considred mediocre.
The other knives have a rampant (rearing and pawing) lion marque. As a matter of fact, you might say the lion is "K" shaped. The blades are additionally screened "Sabatier," and "Made in France," but without reference to any specific maker. The handles are NOT engraved or otherwise marked.
I'm pretty sure these are made "OEM" by one or more of the regular French Sabatier makers with the purpose of marketing them outside of France; and/or are excess or other NOS, relabled. I also believe the U.S. importer is a company called "Cuisine de France," but I may have conflated the knives with other stuff, so am less certain on that.
If Buzzard's lurking, he might have some knowledge. Buzzer?
At any rate, I had a couple of those "Lion Rampants" which I purchased through Amazon around 2001, or 2002, and believe they were made by K-Sabatier. They sure felt like it. I may even still have one -- I'm not sure the logo's faded.
Those knives were typical of K-Sabatier production in the seventies through early nineties, i.e., is good F&F on the handles and grinding, lousy profiling and sharpening. The knives needed a fair amount of profiling in order to get the bevels even and flat -- but considering how easy it is to work with French carbon, it's hard to make that much of an issue. If it were some sort of super hard die-steel it would be a different matter, I mean, you were going to have to sharpen the knife anyway.
You may not know it, but knife steel hardens a bit if the knives are left setting for a long time. Those knives felt harder than I expected, which is part of the reason I suspect those two in particular may have been relabled NOS. On the other hand, "feeling" for hardness is incredibly unreliable. Heck, doing a Rockwell C test with an actual officially certified pin and gauge is unreliable.
Take it for what it's worth, but I'd stick with one of the known good Sabatiers like K-Sabatier, TI ****Elephant, and TI "Nogent;" and maybe Mexeuer et Cie (Therias Le Economie's top line) too.
Hope this helps,
BDL
