Jim,
Re. Your mention of a Laz Bichagi thought to be of Kurdish-Armenian origin, in the generally execrable album of weapons from the Russian Ethnographic Museum, #191 is an example of a sword with a typical Laz blade and yataghan-ish “eared” handle, bought in Tashkent ( Uzbekistan) in 1934 and allegedy called “Shoi”. The museum attributed it as “ Front Asia” ( that’s how Central Asia is often called in the Russian literature).
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