[Ren Ren]

Originally Posted by ariel

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In summary, I see nothing Caucasian in the final product, and the “dog breakfast” of parts ( including conceivably even the blade, with which you hesitantly agree) do not give me any faith in the authenticity of this chimera of a shashka.

Chimera - this is when in Brooklyn an Indian blade of the beginning of the 20th century is attached to an Polish hilt of the late 18th century
In this case, we see:
1) the hilt - the Caucasus, the 19th century
2) the blade - the Caucasus, the 19th century
3) the details of the scabbard - the Caucasus, the 19th - beginning of the 20th century.

Originally Posted by ariel

I could not find anything similar in any of Rivkin’s books, in any edition of Astvatsaturyan’s book, or in a book ( album, essentially) of the Russian Ethnographic Museum.

The lack of similar items in books is a very weak argument. If I took it into account, I would have to admit the absence of Vietnam and Laos weapons in nature. And since Indochina’s weapons are the subject of my main interest, I know for sure that this is not so.

Originally Posted by ariel

Assay chamber stamps used initials of the inspector, a symbol ( female head or a coat of arms of a city where it was assayed) and the purity of silver. I am unaware of any official stamps with Cyrillic “AC” and no other official information required by law from the imperial assay inspectors. АС cannot be an abbreviation of Assaying Chamber: Russians did not call it as such in English. In Russian it was Probirnaya Palata.

I don’t understand where the assumption came from, that the letters AC can be an abbreviation of the Assay Chamber in English. It can only be a personal mark of the assay inspector. The set of characters you listed has become mandatory in the Russian Empire since the 1880s. Earlier in the Caucasus, much simpler rules applied. Which, moreover, did not apply to the item produced for the local market - silver made by the masters of Dagestan for customers in Dagestan does not have assay marks.