Introduction to a traditional Turkish knife-Serik Biçaği

Those are some knives I got for next to nothing on a local flea market from a really nice Turkish gentleman. They are native to Serik in the Antalya region of Turkey and they are a really traditional and old design, maybe dating back to the early medieval ages. https://www.kulturportali.gov.tr/turkiye/antalya/nealinir/serik-bicagi Formerly a pure friction folder design, they share some chatacteristics with knives like the Corse "goat knife ". Originally the knife consisted of a piece of ram's, goat's or sheep's Horn, rarely cow Horn. They are often called Serik biçaği. The knives I own have a very simple backlock mechanism. The really thin blade is held in the handle by friction but locks when open. One has a walnut handle, one Micarta and one traditional ram's horn. The one with the goat horn handle has a blade handforged from saw blade steel, the one with Micarta is made from HSS, the one with the walnut handle is supposedly made from Böhler steel. The blades are 11,2, 11,4, and 11,8 cm long, but just 1,2 -1,4 mm thick. They have a convex bevel to zero, which results in frightening sharpness, although they came rather blunt originally. Some time and effort fixed that and BOY,DO they cut. The locking mechanism on the one with the ram's horn handle is quite good, the others have a bit of radial play. Given that they are friction folder designs originally that is totally okay with me, but you cannot expect a modern knife. The blades are obviously not a prybar. As a folding kitchen knife for foraging and food prepping you are hard pressed to find anything slicier. And edge holding capacity on mine is actually really great. They also cost less than 40€ if you can get one, mine actually cost less than 15€ each. That puts them head to head to Opinel, Pallares Solsona and other folding knives. If you are looking for functionality alone, I have to say that the Opinel is a tad more reliable and the quality is a bit more consistent. But they are actually even slicier than the Opinel and culturally interesting. So you might want to give one a try.