AN INLAID WALNUT MUSICAL DUTCH QUARTERS STRIKING AND AUTOMATON CALENDAR LONGCASE CLOCK, GERARD POUSSET, AMSTERDAM, CIRCA 1790

14-inch dial with arcaded minutes to the silvered chapter ring, signed Gerards Pousset, Amsterdam, matted center with seconds dial enclosing a calendar aperture, sectors for day of the week and month with ruling deity and applied tune selection arc, the lower painted section flanked by reclining figures above a shaped aperture with lunar disc and automaton ship connected to the pendulum and automaton windmill connected to the strike, the massive three train movement with T-shaped plates striking the hours on a large bell and, at the half, the following hour on a small bell, the quarters announced with a single blow, a selection of tunes played by a 10-inch pinned brass barrel, mounted across the backplate, on fifteen separately mounted bells with thirty hammers, the case with caddy cresting, gilt-wood urn finials, broken pediment with central walnut finial above panels of fretwork and Corinthian stop-fluted hood pilasters, the trunk door with bead-moulded edge, applied with a brass bird and urn lenticle and inlaid with a satinwood swag, canted corners with carved husks above inlaid volutes, similarly decorated outswept plinth raised on tapered feet.

PROVENANCE

Time Museum Inventory No. 964
Sotheby's New York, Masterpieces from the Time Museum, Part II, June 19, 2002, lot 207