THREE LOCKS CHEST. WALNUT. SPAIN, 17TH CENTURY.

Three-lock chest with drawers. Walnut wood. Spain, 17th century. Rectangular chest with flat lid unique for its format and constitution. It presents a decoration on the front and both sides with moldings resembling architectural elements in the corners, a fine molding bordering the bolts and making similar drawings on the sides (creating ogee and lobed shapes); a succession of moldings in the lower area, combined in front with an architectural element; a band below in which the three drawers are presented, with a fluted front and iron handles; and a cut skirt over the legs of the furniture. Inside, there is a partition on one side, occupying the entire side: from bottom to top, three drawers with access outside this space, that front decorated with moldings resembling drawers, and an access with a flat lid with a hinge at the top of the partition; It should be noted that inside there is a space and a piece of wood that slides, revealing a normal drawer with access without moving the wood and another smaller, secret drawer, only accessible by moving that wood. The keys present marked differences between themselves and the usual decoration in this type of pieces from the period. Chests with three locks are also often known as “Town Hall” or “Council” chests, because both these and those with two keys were often used by religious, military or civil organizations to store valuable objects and documents, securing them with a key. to each person responsible (as many people as there are locks and keys), so that they had to get together to open the furniture. In many places in the Spanish territories it was used as a municipal archive, following laws inherited from a pragmatic law of June 9, 1500 with which the Catholic Monarchs forced the Councils of their territories to build town hall houses, prisons and have an ark of privileges. and writings. Despite having been abundant in their time, numerous examples have not reached us because they fell into disuse and were replaced. Compare with that of the Council of Villafranca de la Marisma (Los Palacios and Villafranca, Seville), that of Valdipiélago (León), that of Matapozuelos (Valladolid), that of the Cabildo of Buenos Aires of Argentina (18th century, following previous models), etc Stylistically speaking, Castilian chests are usually much simpler on the outside and do not usually have drawers on the outside like those of the present piece. Both Spanish and northern European examples are known with moldings on the outside deviating and drawing shapes on the keyhole shields. What is clearly exceptional is the presence of drawers on the outside and that architectural decoration mentioned previously.

· Size: 140x68x94 cms