Christopher Pinchbeck Senior, an ebonized quarter repeating table clock with automata, English, circa 1780

6-inch silvered chapter ring with matted center signed Chris Pinchbeck Senior, London on a recessed silvered plaque and with calendar aperture, all set on a painted cartouche-shaped surround with flower corners and an attractive automaton scene in the arch of a workshop depicting figures sawing, hammering and operating bellows all activated by the pendulum, a further figure sharpening at a grindstone driven by the strike train, a windmill in the rural landscape beyond revolving its sails during the striking sequence, a strike/silent lever above XII, the bell striking fusee movement with six knopped pillars, verge escapement and pull repeating the quarters on six bells, the backplate engraved with leaf scrolls around a basket of fruit, inverted bell top case with carrying handle, cone finials, gilt-brass door frets and brass framed aperture to the front door, the sides with wood frets above glazed panels, brass block feet.

Time Museum Inventory No. 3795

Knowles-Brown, F.H. "The Pinchbecks." Antiquarian Horology. (June 1954), pp. 26-28

Christopher Pinchbeck 'Senior’ (1710-1783) was the son of the Christopher Pinchbeck (1670-1732) who invented a zinc/copper alloy resembling gold which became known as Pinchbeck. The older Pinchbeck was a celebrated maker of musical and astronomical clocks, his son 'Senior’ worked with his father and continued at his father’s premises in Fleet Street for six years after his father’s death. He became clockmaker to the King and made fine clocks in the tradition of his father.