Japanese: 革包丁 (kawa hōchō), Korean: 가죽 칼 (gajug kal)
a general-purpose knife for working with leather in the form of a thin, flat blade mounted in a handle offset to one side, with the cutting edge at the far edge of the blade, perpendicular to the long axis of the handle
While some English-language importers marketed these as “Japanese skiving knives” early on, they are designed and used for a much broader set of uses. They are also made and used in other East Asian countries, such as South Korea.
East Asian leather knife blades are typically of relatively hard pure or laminated carbon steel and beveled on just the top side. The cutting edges are typically completely straight, rather than bellied or curved, and set either perpendicular to the long axis of the handle or at at a shallow angle to it.
In contrast to European-style shoe knives, a skife, or a super skiver, but similar to a head knife, Japanese leather knives are typically pushed for skiving, rather than pulled.
Like European shoe knives, East Asian leather knives are typically pulled for cutting, whittling, and incising. However, the position of the blade relative to the handle requires that this be done in reverse grip, with the blade behind the pinkie finger, near the wrist, rather than ahead of the thumb and index finger. As with a lip knife, pulling from the arm tends to straighten the wrist during the cut, which can help prevent the blade from wandering.