Sabrage

Sabrage means opening a champagne bottle by sliding a blade along the neck to strike off the glass lip below the cork. The blow delivered where the seam meets the lip concentrates the stresses and severs the neck in a single stroke. This spectacular practice dates to the Napoleonic era and the hussars of the light cavalry. Champagne sabres are deliberately left unsharpened, since the effect relies on the glass's stress point rather than a cutting edge.