Pelikan made its first fountain pen, the Pelikan 100, in 1929, with a piston filler based on a patent it had bought from Theodor Kovàcs in 1925. In May 1950 came the 400, which was revised as the 400N at the end of 1955 and the 400NN in April 1956 and stayed in production until 1965. In 1982 Pelikan brought that shape back as the M400, the start of the Souverän range. Souverän is German for sovereign, and the M stands for Mechanik-Füller, German for a piston pen. Secondhand, the nib is where most of the confusion lives. Richard Binder reckons Pelikan made more standard nib grades than any other maker, and it changed what some of the letters mean.
Reading the nib grade
Modern Pelikan nibs use the familiar round grades, EF, F, M, B, BB and BBB. Obliques have an O in front, as in OF, OM, OB and OBB, and on a modern pen these are essentially round tips shaped for people who rotate the pen as they write. Italics are marked IM and IB.
Older nibs need more care. Binder notes that the tip shapes behind a few markings changed, probably in the mid-1980s. On a vintage Pelikan, B meant a medium italic, BB a broad italic and BBB an extra-broad italic. Vintage obliques are numbered 04 to 09, all left-foot, from 04 for triple broad down to 09 for extra-fine. So a 400NN listed as a Broad may write a crisp italic line, which is good news if you want one and a surprise if you don't. Pelikan also made a beginner's nib marked A, with an angled, flat-ended tip, and those are now scarce.
Modern nibs are firm and carry a lot of tipping. The Pelikan's Perch, a long-running collector site, says they write wider than their grade and suggests ordering one size smaller than you think you want, more so with the gold nibs.
Reading the gold mark
Pelikan nibs usually carry both a karat mark and a fineness number, such as 14C-585 or 18C-750. The C is the European way of writing karat, where U.S. makers used K, and 585 means 58.5% gold. Pelikan has used 14C since its first pens in 1929. You'll occasionally see 12C-500, made mostly for East Asian markets in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and 20C-833, made around 1989 and 1990, mostly for Japan.
The Souverän sizes and their nibs
- M200. Strictly part of Pelikan's Classic line, introduced in 1985. The M200 is the same size as the M400 and has a gold-plated stainless steel nib.
- M400. The 1982 revival of the 400 and the standard-size Souverän. The M400 has a 14C gold nib.
- M600. Introduced in 1985 at the same size as the M400. In 1997 Pelikan made it longer and wider, so there are two pens with one name. Early ones changed nibs too, starting with single-tone 18C-750, then a short run of two-tone 14C-585 around 1988 and 1989, and two-tone 18C-750 from 1990. Post-1997 pens have two-tone 14C-585 nibs. A 1992 M600 is the smaller version, so ask for a photo beside an M400 if a listing doesn't give the size.
- M800. Introduced in 1987. The M800 is a bigger pen with a brass piston mechanism. The first ones had two-tone 14C nibs, and two-tone 18C nibs took over around 1990.
- M1000. The flagship, from 1997. The M1000 also has an 18C nib, one of the largest on any regular production pen. PenHero calls it a soft, wet writer, and many owners consider it the closest a modern pen comes to a flexible nib.
Two dating tells help in photos. The cap-top logo showed two chicks from the late 1930s to 2003 and one chick after that. Pens marked W.-Germany were made before reunification, and pens marked Germany come from after about 1992. Pelikan also changed the trim on several models in 1997.
Screw-out nib units
On a modern Pelikan the nib and feed come out together as one threaded unit. Hold the nib and feed between thumb and forefinger and turn gently counterclockwise. Don't pull the nib off the feed. Binder warns that wiggling it free can crease the side of the nib.
Units swap between some models and not others. These are the main groups on Binder's interchangeability chart.
- M200, M400 and M600 units interchange, along with others such as the M101N and M120. An M215's steel nib fits an M600, but it's slightly smaller than the M600's own nib and looks out of place next to gold trim.
- M800 units fit only the M800 family and the M900 Toledo.
- M1000 units fit only the M1000 family.
- Modern M200-type units fit most vintage 140, 400, 400N and 400NN pens. They won't fit vintage 400s with a slip-fit, unthreaded nib unit. The Perch notes that some very early 400s had friction-fitted nibs before Pelikan went back to screw collars by August 1950.
- The nib unit from the P200 cartridge pen, introduced in 2014, screws into any pen that takes M200 nibs, but it stops the piston from working. If a piston pen's listing says it won't fill, ask which nib unit is fitted.
Because units swap so easily, read the nib in the listing photos and don't assume it's original. A steel nib in an M400 means the unit has been changed.
Older semi-flexible nibs on the 400NN and 100
Pelikan's vintage nibs have a following of their own. The Perch describes them as having far less tipping than modern ones and as springy to semi-flexible for the most part, and says the vintage 14 karat nibs had a flex the modern ones lack. The 400NN usually carries a 14C-585 nib, with some 18C ones around. On the 400 Pelikan swapped script lettering on the nib for the logo by December 1954. The Pelikan 100 is older still, made from 1929 to 1944, and its nib is held in the section by a collar. Its gold nibs are 14 carat, and the Pelikan collectors' site pelikan-collectibles.com notes that early nibs made for stenographers were very flexible. Pelikan moved to palladium nibs marked PD in 1938 and chrome-nickel ones marked CN in 1939, so a PD or CN nib on an early-1930s pen is a replacement.
Semi-flexible means the line widens under extra pressure and springs back. The Perch's "for the most part" matters, since not every vintage nib will do it. Ask the seller for a writing sample with light and firm strokes side by side, and check in the photos that the tines meet evenly at the tip. Read the grade letter as well, because a vintage B or BB is an italic and varies its line without any pressure at all.
Which nib to choose
For a first modern Souverän, take the Perch's advice and go a size finer than you'd pick on another brand. If you want a nib with more spring, look at a 400NN or a 100 with a grade you can read in the photos and a writing sample that shows the line moving. For judging nibs from photos, see nib red flags, and start with the first vintage pen roadmap if this is your first.
