Karud: the weapon that did not exist:-)

[Oliver Pinchot]

Interesting topic, Ariel. I applaud and support your work here.
And you are correct, I didn't use that term in Arms of the Paladins because it did not exist as a distinct word in its period of use. Like a number of other inaccurate names applied to weapons, it was recorded by early European and American students of arms and armor who were seeking to establish a viable taxonomy, as they heard it in situ.

Fernando and Alan, please forgive me for reiterating what you have already stated with modesty, simplicity, and complete accuracy in this thread... Karud is nothing more than the precise transliteration into Latin letters of the way the Persian word kard (which just means "knife") was and is pronounced in Persian and Dari: with a distinct alveolar trill. Another example would be the word for “leather,” charm, which comes out sounding like charrr-um.)

The problem lies, not with Persian, but with the pronunciation of the letter R in American and British English, French and German; it is virtually impossible to transliterate even an approximately similar sound in these languages without inserting a U between the R and D, simply because none of them roll the R in common speech. Italian, Spanish, Russian (and many others,) however, would likely not have the same problem. Conversely, I could not for a moment imagine how an Iranian scholar would go about transliterating the American pronunciation of the word squirrel into Persian.