palette knife

a thin blade of varying flexibility set in a handle and used for mixing colors or applying them to a canvas.

Origin of palette knife

First recorded in 1750–60

With the handle of a palette-knife he stirred the crumbs and milk together and stepped back as she thrust her nose into the mess.

The King in Yellow |Robert W. Chambers
Rosa (Salvator): dark, inscrutable pictures, relieved by dabs of palette-knife.

Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama |E. Cobham Brewer
To obtain the freedom of accident Rembrandt put on his colours with his palette-knife; a very common practice at the present day.

Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXXVIII. February, 1843. Vol. LIII. |Various
What has been said with regard to Rembrandt laying on his colours with the palette-knife, is very much exaggerated.

Rembrandt and His Works |John Burnet

It astonished them to see him use his palette-knife instead of a brush to put on paint and spread it over the canvas.

The Land's End |W. H. Hudson

palette knife

a round-ended spatula with a thin flexible blade used esp by artists for mixing, applying, and scraping off paint, esp oil paint

a knife with a round-ended flexible blade used in cookery for scraping out a mixture from a bowl, spreading icing, etc