[Mende]

If you want it to cleave like a surgeon's scalpel you want a curved shamshir design, or something like a Katana. ...The steel should be high in carbon ..

And if you want it to cut well AND be light ..you have to do a clay hardening.

Mix clay, coal dust and straw ash and apply it to all but the edge ..then heat the whole body of the blade at once. ..and quench it in lukewarm water

do not temper it afterwards. .
( I have started a new thread to see if anyone knows the recipe for this . .I'm also not sure about the not tempering it part. .but I am convinced that if you quench it properly . .tempering will do more harm then good.)

let a professional sharpen it. . .and learn from him. ..
if it didn't crack after the quenching . .it probably never will.