gun locks

[elk killer]

anyone know where the term came from?
was it gun locks before door locks?
cant lock anything with a gun lock
so why is it called a lock?

[Majorjoel]

Best I can tell you is that it is an item that was made by a "locksmith". I wonder why they didn't call bear traps bear locks???    I suppose that if the first gun locks would have been made by a blacksmith we might be using the name Flintblack or matchblack 

[hpdrifter]

because it has a tumbler?

[Pete G.]

Smith is a derivative of smyte. There are more than a few on this forum who have whacked both a lock and a gun; several times.

[omark]

all other known words were taken???            mark

[Jerry V Lape]

How about they weren't called flintlocks.  Weren't they known first as snaphaunce, fusil,  focile?  Torsten Lenk goes on for a chapter in his book, THE FLINTLOCK, Its Origin, Development and Use, wrestling with the names applied to the various evolutions in lock mechanisms.  But he makes no mention of how the term "lock" became involved in the English language. 

[omark]

maybe because the hammer or "cock" is locked to the rear to be later unlocked by the trigger. !!   mark

[DaveP (UK)]

I believe that once things moved on from the simple manually operated matchlock  the new gadgets were known as firelocks because you had to get a  locksmith to make you one. They were the only craftsmen skilled in producing complicated ironwork on this scale.
Couldn't say where I got this from - school?...  

[Mark Elliott]

I believe I read that the Moravians had locksmiths separate from gunsmiths that made both door locks and guns locks.   They both involved tumblers and springs.    Aside from clocks,  locks would have been some of the most complicated technology around at the time.   Locks involved working with steel that could be hardened and tempered as opposed to just working iron and it involved using that steel to move other steel or iron parts.   Patchbox release mechanisms are very similar.  I have seen a Moravian patchbox release that looked and operated just like a deadbolt lock.   I can certainly see how they would have been seen as related.   

[jerrywh]

Don't ask me where I got this info but I read it somewhere years ago . This pertains to European or English guns. Regular blacksmithing was not very sophisticated and mostly consisted of shoeing horses and making implements including perhaps utensils etc. etc..  There was another profession and as usual these professions were gilded. That profession was that of a locksmith. These locksmiths possessed smaller and more sophisticated tools than regular smith and were more highly trained to do precision work. Gun parts were small and required more precision so therefore the locksmiths were commissioned to forge the gun parts and the main part was referred to by them as a gunlock. Later on it was flintlock, percussion lock etc etc. Manton in England farmed out  locks and parts of locks  to hundreds if not thousands of small shops and individuals. In the 18th century this was common knowledge.

[DaveP (UK)]

Aside from clocks,  locks would have been some of the most complicated technology around at the time.

I've always been intrigued by the history of technology. Don't know whether to laugh or cry about the way in which military needs have so often been the driving force. It would certainly be interesting to compare time lines of clock and gun lock development - if anyone had time on their hands... 

I imagine the focus would need to be on or around the Tudor period. Henry 8 had an early clock installed at Hampton Court. He was a keen archer and the pride of his navy was famously well stocked with bows and arrows when she sank. By the end of Elizabeth 1's reign the gun had effectively replaced the bow on the battlefield. This was partly due to the lengthy training necessary to produce men with the physique required for the war bow, but the guns of the day must have been fairly reliable, all the same. Behind the scene their must have been some sort of economic upheaval as the nationwide but rural gathering of feathers and shafts was replaced by the probably urban manufacture of guns and powder.

I had a look in The Perfect Gun, published in Portugal in 1718. The use of the word lock in the gun trade was so well established by then that it merited no explanation

[Larry Luck]

Interesting question.  Here's one source that examines the several meanings of the word "lock" and is about as confusing as anybody would want:

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/lock

Enjoy.

Larry Luck

[kaintuck]

Maybe call them bangs ticks?
Marc

[Majorjoel]

I find it ironic that since this question was asked I have spent considerable time going through several of my old reference books as well as many different web sites. Alas to no avail. It seems that it is the "simple" most basic questions that are truly taken for granted.  I now can finally find peace from my childhood where my grandfather's answer to one of my long forgotten questions..........."JUST BECAUSE"!   And to Bruce Hornsby's old song....."That's just the way it is".

[elk killer]

Joel, great answer.!!

[Swampwalker]

Does anybody have access to the OED? 

[Kermit]

Full access on line ain't cheap. This is about as close as one can easily come. I'm not sure it will shed much light, however. It DOES serve to illustrate the amazing language we share.

http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/american_english/lock

[Carl Young]

OED=

Lock
Forms:  OE loc, locc, ME–16 locke, ME loke, ME–15 lokk(e, ME, 16 lok, look(e, (17–18 dial. in sense  2 luck, Sc. loake), ME– lock.(Show Less)

Etymology:  Old English loc (masculine) = Old Saxon? loc (MS. loci, glossing cesariem; Middle Dutch locke, Dutch lok feminine), Old High German loc (masculine) (Middle High German loc (masculine), plural locke, modern German locke feminine), Old Norse lokk-r (masculine) (Swedish lock, Danish lok) < Old Germanic *lokko-z, *lukko-z < pre-Germanic *lugno-s. Cognate words in Germanic are Old Norse lykkja loop, bend (Norwegian lykke, Danish løkke), modern Icelandic (h)lykkur a bend.

5. In firearms, the piece of mechanism by means of which the charge is exploded. (See also firelock n., flint-lock n., matchlock n.) Phr. lock, stock, and barrel = the entirety of anything; also as adv.phr. (See also stock n.1 28b) [Appears first in the comb. firelock n.   Probably the name is due to some resemblance of the mechanism of the original wheel firelock to that of a lock (sense  1). Compare German schloss, used both for the ‘lock’ of a door and the ‘lock’ of a gun.]

1547   Inventory in Meyrick Antient Armour III. 15   One chamber pece blacke..with a fier locke.

1681   N. Grew Musæum Regalis Societatis 366   Under the Breech of the Barrel is one Box for the Powder. A little before the Lock, another for the Bullets; Behind the Cock, a Charger, which carries the Powder to the further end of the Lock.

1725   London Gaz. No. 6390/2,   They broke some of the Locks of their Pieces.

1833   J. Holland Treat. Manuf. Metal II. 90   The priming was laid in the hollow at the side of the lock.

1839   F. Marryat Phantom Ship I. iv. 78   I'll put a new flint in my lock.

1842   W. T. Thompson Major Jones' Courtship (1844) 66   All moved, lock, stock, and barrel.

1855   S. A. Hammett Wonderful Adventures Captain Priest xii. 76   He sold off his feathered stock, ‘lock, stock, and barrel’.

1891   R. Kipling Light that Failed v. 80   The whole thing, lock, stock, and barrel, isn't worth one big yellow sea-poppy.

1909   Sat. Evening Post 1 May 5/3   See? He's cagey about going to 'em, but when a good medium gets him in front of her he swallows it all, lock, stock and barrel.

1961   B. Fergusson Watery Maze xii. 292   One of the ministries would take over lock, stock and barrel the administration.

1974   P. Erdman Silver Bears i. 12,   I bought us a Swiss bank: lock, stock and barrel.

Flintlock=
 a. A gun-lock in which a flint, screwed to the cock, is struck against the hammer and produces sparks which ignite the priming in the flash-pan. Also attrib., as flint-lock gun, flint-lock musket.

1683   J. Turner Pallas Armata 176   It were there~fore good, that for the half of the Muskets (if not for them all) flint-locks were made.

1887   Whitaker's Almanack 541   The old flint-lock musket became famous in the Peninsular War under the name of ‘Brown Bess’.

Firelock=
1. A gun-lock in which sparks were produced (either by friction or percussion) to ignite the priming.The name was at first given to the wheel-lock n.; in the 17th cent. it became transferred to the flint-lock n.

1547   Inventory in Meyrick Antient Armour III. 15   One chamber pece blacke..with a fier locke.

1625   G. Markham Souldiers Accidence 53   Pistolls, Petronells, or Dragons..all these are with fire-lockes, and those fire-lockes (for the most part) Snap-hances.

1639   R. Ward Animadversions of Warre i. 293   The Firelocke is surest to give fire, and not so apt to be out of kilter; besides they will indure Spand 24 houres together without hurting them.

1663   Marquis of Worcester Cent. Names & Scantlings Inventions    A perfect Pistol..with Prime, Powder and Fire~lock.

1677   Earl of Orrery Treat. Art of War 31   In the Fire-lock the motion is so sudden, that what makes the Cock fall on the Hammer, strikes the Fire, and opens the Pan at once.

[Kermit]

“And books which told me everything about the wasp, except why.”
Dylan Thomas