Unknown speaker hookups

[AlecK]

I moved into a new place a bit ago that has cabinet speakers built into the bookshelves. The wires for the speakers run under the floorboards and come out on the other end of the room. The problem is, Im a bit of a novice and have never seen wiring of this sort (see attached picture). How do I hook these up to a receiver? Thanks

 

[DerStrom8]

Welcome to ETO, AlecK!
Those speaker wires are intended for the type of connector shown here:

If you do not have this type of connector, you will need to make some minor modifications to the wires, namely connect a plug that would fit the speaker connection on your head unit.

 

[cr0sh]

AlecK, DerStrom8:

You say the speakers are built into the bookshelves - how many are there? Are there others in the house? Do you know the condition of any of them? DerStrom8 might be correct here, that they are just bare wires for connection into spring terminals - but if you only have a pair of speakers in a single bookshelf and no others, then you will have a bit of investigation to do. Something to keep in mind is maybe this was a multi-room speaker installation (are there any weird plates on the wall in the rooms - blank plates, or plates with terminals of any sorts)? You might have the beginnings of a very sweet multi-room setup, once you trace the wires.

 

[DerStrom8]

AlecK, DerStrom8:

You say the speakers are built into the bookshelves - how many are there? Are there others in the house? Do you know the condition of any of them? DerStrom8 might be correct here, that they are just bare wires for connection into spring terminals - but if you only have a pair of speakers in a single bookshelf and no others, then you will have a bit of investigation to do. Something to keep in mind is maybe this was a multi-room speaker installation (are there any weird plates on the wall in the rooms - blank plates, or plates with terminals of any sorts)? You might have the beginnings of a very sweet multi-room setup, once you trace the wires.

That is basically what I was thinking. If you look closely at the wires in the photo, there are actually several groups of red and black wires. There are only a couple with stripped ends in the picture, and the rest are just cut off. Apparently, only two speakers were being used previously, but because of the other wires, it is possible to connect several more speakers to the system.
Der Strom

NOTE: It looks like there are nine groups of speaker wires, so that means you could have nine speakers connected to the system, if desirable (and if your stereo system has nine speaker terminals).