Thank you to everyone who ventured a guess for the November’s What Is It? We stumped you this time since no one was able to correctly identify the object.
The item pictured is a lock. Ancient Egyptian locks employed a prototype of the modern pin-tumbler mechanism; the example above is a 19th Century version. It is operated by a wooden key inserted, as shown, from above to fit into pins in the horizontal bolt visible at center.
Try again, everybody. You can win a year’s subscription to the Mountain States Collector. Good luck!
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