Miquelet lock
A Spanish-origin flintlock mechanism that influenced the true flintlock.
The miquelet lock is a modern term for a type of flint-against-steel firing mechanism used in muskets and pistols. It is a distinctive form of snaplock that was prevalent in several empires and regions from the late 16th to the mid-19th century. The term itself was not recorded until the 19th century and is of uncertain origin.
Quick Facts
- First appearance
- within three decades of the 1541 Algiers campaign
- Earliest known surviving example
- item No.I.20 in the Real Armería
- Madrid
- dated before 1600
- Regions of prevalence
- Spanish, Portuguese, and Ottoman empires, Italy, Greece, Russia, Ukraine, North Africa, and the Balkans
- Period of use
- late 16th to mid-19th century
- Traditional spanish name
- llave de rastrillo
- Catalan and valencian name
- pany de pedrenyal or pedrenyal
Facts from the source article.
History
The miquelet lock first appeared in Spain within thirty years of Emperor Charles V’s failed 1541 Algiers campaign, where rain and wind had made arquebuses useless. The novelist Ginés Pérez de Hita, in his book Civil Wars of Granada, mentions the “escopeta de rastrillo” as common in Xàtiva and Valencia before and during the Alpujarras Rebellion (1567–1571). In Don Quixote (1605), Miguel de Cervantes notes that in Catalonia this lock was called a pedrenyal, though long-barreled wheel lock pistols were not given that name. From around 1580, estate auction records increasingly list “arcabuces de rastrillo” and “escopeta de rastrillo”; the term “rastrillar” (to comb) describes how a flint scrapes down a frizzen. Some records also used “llaves de chispa” for all flintlocks, including miquelets. Contemporaries never used the word “miquelet” for any lock or firearm. The oldest known surviving patilla miquelet is item I.20 in Madrid’s Real Armería, a combination lance and double-barreled gun made almost certainly before 1600. This early Spanish lock was later refined by Madrid and provincial gunmakers, notably the Marquart family of royal gunmakers, into the classic Spanish patilla style.
Main characteristics
The miquelet lock, which combined the battery and pan cover into one piece, was the final step that allowed the true flintlock to exist. It served as both the forerunner of and a contemporary to that later mechanism. There were two main versions. In the Spanish lock, the mainspring pushed upward on the heel of the cock’s foot, and two sears engaged the toe. In the Italian or Roman lock, the mainspring pushed downward on the toe, and the sears engaged the heel. Neither type was limited to its namesake country; examples of each made in the other nation are common. The most recognized traits of the miquelet are horizontal sears that work through the lockplate, an external mainspring, and a ring on the top jaw screw. However, experts consider the horizontal sears the true defining feature, since some miquelet variants lack the external mainspring or the large ring. Spanish miquelets almost always had a striated battery face, or grooved frizzen. At first, this grooved face was a separate plate attached by dovetail and often screws, allowing replacement without reworking the whole battery. This detachable face fell out of use around 1660 to 1675, replaced by grooves cut directly into the battery, likely due to better heat treatment. French-influenced Madrid gunsmiths largely eliminated the grooving by about 1700, but many provincial Spanish, North African, and Ottoman lockmakers kept using it, both detachable and integral. The fully developed lock had various names: in Spain, “llave española” or “patilla” (the classic Spanish miquelet, named because the cock’s front foot looked like a rooster’s foot); in Catalonia, “clau de miquelet”; and in Portugal, “fecho de patilha de invenção.”
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