Ordinary Banana

would you care to speculate publicly about why they're no longer featured on modern axes before i explain the actual reaso, or...?

whatever their original function was, the reason they're no longer commonplace is mass production

haha maybe i have no idea

based on my being a Bicycle Historian that's probably it <some detail that used to take 2% of the total time of producing Bicycle> might take 20% of the total time of producing Bicycle, if you become very fast at doing the raw non-detail stuff

but wouldn't these be cast rather than sculpted?

or cut or worked or w/e

actually, the guy i cited above seems to agree w you for the most part, and he's clearly put some thought into this

tldr: the bevels became decorative or disappeared altogether after the introduction of concave cheeks (which serve the same function), and are absent from most cheap contemporary heads