I'm guessing maybe the bottom one is to take out the ash. And the next one up to put in the wood. But what about the door above that? Then there is this section with no door and the one at the top, I saw opens and has a hole in the bottom of that section with a cover (maybe to regulate air intake?).
I saw these old style wood burning stoves in Alsace and wondered what all the different compartments are for? Anyone know?
Cooking, as an oven maybe ?
Do the compartments go all the way to the back of the burner or is their a gap at the back ?
I've seen an old oven with a compartment for heating a stone. The stone was then used for heating a bed (not sure if the stone goes in the bed or by it).
Could it be something similar for multiple stones?
The bottom one is for ash i would think looking at photo closely, the middle one for wood maybe as it has some sort of device to turn on front door, probably to increase or decrease air flow doing the same for the burn rate of wood and the top one as Mirfield said, for a stone to heat the bed maybe, to cook in or as a bread oven ?
Bottom ash, next up kindling, third up longer logs? The stone idea is interesting, but why the slots? As the whole thing would be almost red-hot, it couldn't be for pushing the heat out. We have a gorgeous old built-in tiled kachelofen, and it only has the ash drawer on the bottom, a higher drawer with a grate to catch nails, etc., and the wood door up about the level of the third one here. It was used to burn coal before we moved in, and they unfortunately left us with a coal-cellar with a giant pile of it.
I was once told that since this heating device was working the whole winter, the heat was used for an oven. Heat the room and make bread. But, it was just an story in a restaurant where it was a decoration thing....no historical fact
Why seperate for kindling and logs ?
The idea behind kindling wood is simply to get the logs alight
In order to fit the long logs in on top of the kindling? Ours stand almost upright. I wonder if the perforations on the top could be for a pan of water for humidity.
Ahhhhhhhh, the search of "soap stone feet warmer" yields a very interesting result:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bed_warmer
Used to see these in boot sales.
tangentially, I see some relationship between kachelofen and caquelon.