History & Evolution
The history of scissors from Egyptian spring scissors (1500 BCE) to modern Japanese powder metallurgy. Key milestones, innovations, and how Japan's blade regions moved from swords to scissors.
Build a dated evidence chain around the exact claim
Origin stories become useful when the actor, place, event, record, and uncertainty remain visible. Apply to History & Evolution
- 01 Claim Write the narrow proposition before searching for supporting records.
- 02 Date Distinguish event date, publication date, later recollection, and current claim.
- 03 Actor and place Name the person, company, institution, location, and role evidenced.
- 04 Boundary Preserve attribution, disagreement, missing records, and what the source cannot establish.
Do not inferHeritage language, an anniversary, museum, patent, old photograph, or repeated retailer story cannot prove first, invention, adoption, continuity, or current production.
Overview
The scissor is one of humanity’s oldest and most enduring tools. From bronze spring scissors in ancient Egypt to computer-controlled powder-metallurgy blades hardened to HRC 67, the evolution of scissors tracks the broader history of metallurgy, trade, and craft specialization. For professional hairdressers, understanding this history illuminates why certain design traditions persist and why the geography of scissor manufacturing looks the way it does today.
Timeline
| Date | Event | Significance |
|---|---|---|
| ~1500 BCE | Egyptian spring scissors | Earliest known scissors — two bronze blades connected by a curved spring strip. No pivot. Used for grooming and textile work. |
| ~100 CE | Roman pivoted scissors | Romans introduced the cross-blade, pivoted design that remains the fundamental scissor architecture today. |
| Kamakura period (13th century) | Seki swordsmithing begins | Swordsmiths settle in Seki (関市), Mino Province, Japan. Access to good clay, pine charcoal and water from the Nagara and Tsubo rivers makes the region a blade-making center. |
| 1628 | Zhang Xiaoquan founded | 張小泉 (Zhāng Xiǎoquán) established in Hangzhou, China. Now the world’s oldest continuously operating scissors brand, still manufacturing today. |
| 1740s | Sheffield crucible steel | Benjamin Huntsman develops crucible steel in Sheffield, England. The process produces homogeneous, high-carbon steel suitable for precision blades. |
| 1761 | First cast steel scissors | Robert Hinchliffe of Sheffield produces the first scissors from cast steel, replacing the forged iron and shear steel that limited previous designs. This marks the beginning of the modern scissor industry. |
| 1876 | Japanese sword abolishment | The 廃刀令 (haitōrei / Sword Abolishment Edict) bans most former samurai from wearing swords in public. Demand for swords falls, and over the following decades Seki’s blade makers move into knives, razors and later scissors. |
| 1917 | Tokosha (Joewell) founded | 東光舎 (Tōkōsha) is founded in Tokyo. It makes barber scissors from 1921 and adopts the Joewell brand name in 1975. |
| 1921 | Mizutani founded | Mizutani Scissors begins production. The company would grow to become one of the most recognized names in professional hairdressing scissors worldwide. |
| 1967 | Hikari founded | Tokyo maker Hikari is established in August. It states that it developed the convex (ハマグリ刃, hamaguri-ba) edge for hair scissors and obtained Japan’s first patent for a blade-angle and polishing method. The patent number, filing date and grant date are not published, so the invention and patent claim is attributed to Hikari rather than independently dated, and no specific year can be given for it. |
| 1973 | First cobalt scissors | Kikui Scissors develops the world’s first cobalt-alloy hairdressing scissors, made from an alloy of roughly 70% cobalt rather than stainless steel with cobalt added. |
| 1995 | Solingen Ordinance | Germany enacts legal protection for the “Solingen” origin designation. Only cutlery, scissors included, whose essential manufacturing stages are completed in Solingen or neighboring Haan can carry the name, creating one of the few legally enforced geographic indicators in the cutlery industry. |
| By 2010 | Hayashi HYS-MAX67 | Hayashi Scissors hardens its HYS-MAX67 powder high-speed steel to HRC 67, among the hardest scissor steels made. The model appears in the Kansai Design Potential Map 2010. |
| 2021 | HSC tags introduced | The Hairdressing Scissors Consortium (HSC), established in 2017 under Japan’s METI brand development project, begins issuing Made in Japan tags in April 2021. Members include Tokosha (Joewell) and Naruto. |
From swords to scissors
The move from swordsmithing to modern scissor manufacturing was regional and gradual. After the 廃刀令 cut demand for swords in 1876, blade workers and businesses moved into civilian tools over several decades, alongside imported machinery and new steels.
Blade-making practices that carried over into scissor production:
- Laminated steel construction. Traditional Japanese swords use a hard cutting edge (刃金 / hagane) wrapped in a softer, shock-absorbing body (地金 / jigane). Modern Japanese scissors sometimes use similar lamination for premium Damascus lines.
- Hand grinding and polishing. The togishi (研ぎ師 / polishing master) tradition carries directly into scissor finishing. The hamaguri-ba convex edge shares its name and principle with sword and knife polishing.
- Quality as identity. Seki’s reputation was built on the principle that a blade bearing the city’s name must meet a certain standard. This culture persists in Japanese scissor manufacturing.
Regional evolution
Japan (Seki City / 関市)
Seki has about 800 years of continuous blade-making history and remains one of Japan’s main cutlery centers, with scissors among its products. See Manufacturing Regions for detailed coverage.
Germany (Solingen)
Solingen’s blade tradition predates legal protection by centuries. German scissors tend toward slightly softer steels, beveled edges, and heavier construction compared to Japanese models — reflecting a different philosophy of durability over sharpness. The 1995 Ordinance formalized what had been an informal geographic reputation.
China (Hangzhou / Zhang Xiaoquan)
Zhang Xiaoquan’s nearly 400-year history makes it the longest-running scissors brand in the world. While primarily focused on household and industrial scissors, the company’s longevity demonstrates the depth of Chinese metallurgical tradition.
Pakistan (Sialkot)
Sialkot emerged as a major scissors manufacturing center in the 20th century, primarily serving the budget and mid-range international market. The city’s role in the global supply chain is detailed in Cost & Pricing.
See Also
Sources
3 sources- Wikipedia — Scissors (encyclopedia)
- Zhang Xiaoquan — Official International (manufacturer official)
- 🌐 HSC — Hairdressing Scissors Consortium (industry consortium)
Frequently Asked Questions
3 answers you can open one at a timeDid Japanese scissor-making grow out of swordsmithing?
Partly, and gradually. The 1876 Haitōrei (廃刀令) stopped most former samurai from wearing swords in public, and demand for swords fell. Over the following decades Seki and other blade regions moved into knives, razors, tools and later scissors, alongside imported machinery, new steels and new markets. Terms such as hamaguri-ba (convex edge) carried over, but a modern scissor’s link to sword making has to be documented by its maker.
What is the world's oldest continuously operating scissor brand?
Zhang Xiaoquan (張小泉), founded in Hangzhou in 1628. Nearly 400 years of unbroken production makes it older than most nations and virtually all other manufacturing companies in any industry. The brand became imperial tribute goods under the Qianlong Emperor in the Qing Dynasty, won a silver medal at the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition, and holds Chinese national intangible cultural heritage status. Mao Zedong mentioned it by name in a 1956 speech about preserving traditional Chinese crafts — few scissors manufacturers have been acknowledged at that level.
When did the 1913 Sheffield breakthrough change scissors forever?
On 20 August 1913, Harry Brearley at Brown Firth Laboratories in Sheffield produced casting 1008 — 12.8% chromium, 0.44% manganese, 0.2% silicon, 0.24% carbon, balance iron. Brearley called it ‘rustless steel’; the name ‘stainless steel’ came later from Ernest Stuart, a cutler at R.F. Mosley. That single invention transformed the entire cutlery and scissors industry worldwide, and every stainless steel scissor in production today traces its material lineage back to this one Sheffield laboratory.