On the Development and Distribution of Primitive Locks and Keys #230527

Of the bar, whether of wood or iron, used for fastening up the door on the inside, little need be said, nor are we at a loss for a commencement in the common door bolt. Figs. 2 and 3, Plate represent the inside View and section of a wooden bolt now in use on barns and outhouses at Gastein, in Austria, and like many of the ordinary appliances which in most countries are now made of metal, it is there constructed entirely of wood, and is such a bolt as might have been used in the most primitive state of society. It is intended to open from the outside, where the handle, consist ing of a flat oblong piece of wood (fig. 3, a, Plate communicates, by means of a neck of wood, with the bolt 1) on the inside, and when shoved home to fasten the door.