Centuries of Time: A Private Collection

Centuries of Time: A Private Collection

View full screen - View 1 of Lot 1387. A gold quarter repeating watch with concealed jacquemart automaton circa 1820, no. 8531.

Swiss

A gold quarter repeating watch with concealed jacquemart automaton circa 1820, no. 8531

Auction Closed

May 14, 02:23 PM GMT

Estimate

8,000 - 10,000 CHF

Lot Details

Description

Swiss


A gold quarter repeating watch with concealed jacquemart automaton

circa 1820, no. 8531


 Movement: full plate gilded, verge escapement, plain three-arm balance, pierced and engraved balance bridge, silver regulation plate, fusee and chain, turned pillars, repeating on blued steel coiled gongs

• Dial: Breguet numerals on outer white enamel chapter ring, centred by applied vari-coloured gold neoclassical building and automaton scene depicting Punch or Pulcinella fighting Chronos appearing in upper gallery from behind a blued steel cover in unison with the hour chimes, two putti below striking the quarter hours in unison with the quarter repeating, all against a blued steel plate

• Case: gold circular engine-turned case, milled band, plunge pendant repeat, pendant locking slide to right of pendant, inside case back with Neuchâtel control mark for 1820-1866, numbered 8531 and with case maker's mark HC incuse, gilt metal cuvette


diameter 58.5mm

R. Chadwick, A Voyage Through Time, London: Unicorn, 2020, pp. 212-213.
Jacquemart figures were a popular addition to repeating watches at the end of the 18th and beginning of the 19th centuries. Influenced by 'striking' figures found on some early European clocks, the automated jacquemart figures are synchronized with the watch's repeating work, thereby giving the illusion that they are creating the sound of the repetition. The majority of repeating watches with jacquemart figures do not incorporate additional automata and the present watch is relatively unusual for its incorporation of a further scene at the top of the dial. Hidden behind a blued steel cover at the centre of the scene's upper gallery, when the pendant is depressed for the repeat, the figures of Punch/Pulcinella and Chronos appear, the arm of Punch appearing to strike Chronos with his hammer.