Door handle is an ambiguous term and includes door locks, bars, and knobs. Depending on the geographical location and their place in time, they vary in design, shape and materials. The only constant is its function: an accessory that is used to open or close a door.

Functions of knobs and handles

The earliest existing gates are approximately 5,000 years old. Door handles, as devices for manipulating a front door, became a necessity soon after the invention of the turning mechanism. To most, pivots are simply known as hinges; however, there are almost as many hinge designs and configurations as there are handles.

The simplest handle is a projection for pulling or pushing on the side opposite the hinge. Handle placement is generally where it will provide optimum mechanical advantage; most doors function as second class levers. Doors with handles or rings in the center, or a pivot point at a location other than an edge of the door, use first-class or third-class lever principles.

Depictions of door handles in paintings dating to the 1st century CE are centrally placed hinged rings. The modern door knocker is a remnant of this primitive style of door handle. Doors were usually secured with bars and brackets to prevent them from being opened by intention or accident.

Knobs with latches and bars

Over time, the large cross bars used to secure a door were replaced by slide bars, operated by a handle secured to the bar and protruding through a slot in the door, or as a pivot bar, often called a pivot bar. latch, which could be placed in a matching slot in the door leg. In colonial America, the operating mechanism for a small pivot bar was a latch chain that passed through a hole in the door near the handle. There are accounts and references, probably apocryphal, implying that this mechanism was a solution to heavy taxes and a crown edict ordering colonists to use only imported English door bolts or locks.

Around the middle of the 18th century, handles and locks were integrated into a single unit, the earliest known examples being levers that operated the latch and served as a pull to open the door.

knobs and handles

The handle as it exists today is a relatively new invention dating back to the mid-19th century, with the first US patent dated to the 1850s. Handles and knobs underwent a massive period of growth and development throughout the Victorian era (1830-1900). Thousands of variations on the door handle theme, combined with modern production methods, made door handles accessible to virtually everyone. Deadbolts faded in popularity and use, relegated to service in barns and similar outbuildings where their design simplicity and function trump outward appearance.

Manage value-added features

These handles today fulfill multiple functions. These functions can include lock and key mechanisms, electronic locks, push button access that is mechanical or electronic, high security features, and many other applications beyond a simple push and pull device to open or close a door.

For most Americans, the terms handle and knob are synonymous. In Europe, however, door levers make up the vast majority of door handles. Due to their usefulness and accessibility, door levers are gaining popularity in the United States. They are much easier for someone with physical problems from arthritis, illness, or injury to operate than round doorknobs. While large, exterior door handles will eventually be supplanted by self-opening mechanisms, door handles will continue to be needed for smaller doors on interior doors, cabinets, and other furniture for centuries to come.