[gp]

just like Jim wrote on the Pandours “the exact nature of the probably widely assorted weapons used by them cannot of course be determined with any certainty. As many of the men in these units were recruited from Balkan regions and ethnic groups in contingent areas, all supplying thier own weapons, it would be impossible to do anything but speculate”

the same applies on the Balkans for the Bash Bazouks as both of them were recruted from locals, who either wanted to escape poverty, have a decent bed, food and clothing or just were ordered as a buffer at the borders to function as a protection force. Hence still the name "Krajina" derived from kraj = end in the former Yugoslavia, meaning military frontier were Vlachs, Serbs, Montenegrins, Croats and Bosnians lived.
And many became Pandours at the Habsburgian side , where on the Ottoman side the same became Bash Bazouks with some Albanians an Greek as well included. Similar like at the Battle of Kosovo, a big day in Serbian history, many Serbs were fighting in service of the Sultan....
That line continues to the "Bosniaken"i.e. the Habsburg Infantery Regiments I -IV which existested from 1882 -1918 (NCOs and other ranks were Muslims, 39.12% were Orthodox and 25.04% were Roman Catholic. The remainder were a mix of Greek Catholics, Jews and Protestants.[1] Regardless of religious faith all other ranks wore the fez. ).

So nothing new on the Balkans, same as the Romans used men from the Illyrian regions to fight the Gaul wars.

It goes without saying that they all brought and used their own local weapons and also used local black smiths to manufacture weapons.
Hence quite some influence from all sides.Like in some earlier post where I showed a bichaq who has Bosnian and Surme characteristics. or one with a painting of a Habsburgian Dalmatian regiment who went into battle with yataghans.

So difficult to say sometimes but I would like to hear more from yataghanman and have him elaborate more on his statement as I do want to learn more.

Elgood, no disrespect intended, is for me not leading on Yataghans as i am reading now Durdica Petrovic's book "Balkan waepons (VII-XIX) , one of 4 she wrote, which Elgood used to write for his piece on yataghans.

By he way Baron Franz von der Trenck was although Prussian an Austrian officer in charge of the pandours, just like many Austrians did on the "Bosniaken" and is a cousin of Friedrich Freiherr von der Trenck,, also world famous because of his adventures.

Coming back to the pandours or grenzer versus bash bazouks: both sides were know for their fierce heroic fighting but also some atrocities...