[Philip]

This is a rather provincial form of an acciarino alla romana (lock in the Roman style), aka romanlock, Italian miquelet, Italian toe lock, etc -- all these terms are neologisms coined over generations by collectors, but they all refer to a snap lock with (1) and external mainspring that bears DOWNWARD on the TOE of the cock (2) combined L-shaped pan cover and frizzen, and (3) twin sear levers, regulated by a single horizontally-acting V-spring and engaging the cock through apertures in the lockplate.

In terms of mainspring configuration it can be classified with the Catalán agujeta (and its derivative Algerian form), the Portuguese fecho de anselmo, and others. However, the alla romana is distinctive in that it has a two-position sear system so it does not rely on "dog" catches or sliding/rotating "brakes" outside the lockplate to provide a safety function.

More familiar to collectors is the common patilla lock aka Spanish miquelet which was also the preferred type of flintlock used throughout Persia and the Ottoman Empire. This type, which has one or two sub-variants, differs in that its mainspring presses UPWARD against the HEEL of the cock. Like the Roman type, it features a two-position sear.

The origins of the alla romana lock are obscure. Claude Blair, in his chapter in the anthology Pollard's History of Firearms, cites this system combined with a wheellock mechanism on a single detached lock in the Artillery Museum in Turin, which he dates as possibly the second half of the 16th cent. At any rate, it was fully developed as of early in the 17th, and became the preferred flint mechanism in parts of Central Italy, particularly the regions Lazio (where Rome is located), le Marche, and Umbria.

Roman-type locks also had a degree of popularity in Spain (where it was referred in contemporaneous texts as the llave de invención) and in Portugal where an important gunsmithing manual written at the close of the 17th cent. calls it a fecho anselmo à romana. In these two countries such locks appear to have been reserved for guns intended for the luxury market, since surviving examples tend to be of exquisite quality.

Where this particular lock was made is open to some question. Compared to published examples of this type, and to many actual examples in varying quality grades which I've handled at auctions and gun shows, this one is quite rustic in its execution. Considerably so, not only for the work on the frizzen but also for the construction of the sears, which on most Italian examples tends to be quite tight and neat despite any lack of artistry on the exterior embellishment. Nonetheless, I'll have to think again about dismissing it as an "eastern" copy. Gen. Agostino Gaibi, in his publications, has extensively discussed Italian export of patilla - type locks to the Balkans, and this is also the type of lock that was almost exclusively imitated (other than the later French flintlock) in Ottoman domains. Morocco copied the Dutch snaphaunce and the rest of the Maghreb adopted the Catalán agujeta with its characteristic dog safety. W. Keith Neal, in Spanish Guns and Pistols, shows a couple of interesting early Spanish detached locks which are stylistically prototypical of the familiar Algerian and Ottoman forms, but neither are the Roman type. I would like to see an intact example of one of these "eastern" guns with a Roman-style lock of some kind mounted on it, then the discussion can proceed further.