An important 18ct gold four-minute tourbillon watch with échappement naturel, state-of-wind indication, subsidiary seconds and piston activated observation seconds

Breguet No. 1890 | Delivered to Monsieur Frédéric Frackman on 16 May 1809 and sold to Comte Alexis Razoumoffsky for Fr 3,240

Standard VAT applies to hammer price and buyer's premium

Auction Closed

November 9, 08:49 PM GMT

Estimate

350,000 - 700,000 CHF

Lot Details

Description

24’’’ gilded movement, crescent-shaped backplate, reverse chain fusee with maintaining power, échappement naturel with unusual escape wheels comprising a large 12-toothed wheel and small 3-toothed wheel, spring detent with triangular ruby locking jewel, three-arm bi-metallic compensation balance with meantime and movable adjustment screws, the roller with two ruby impulse pallets, free-sprung spiral steel spring with terminal curve, mounted on a four-minute tourbillon carriage, ruby and sapphire jewels, plain cylindrical pillars secured with pins

gold dial, engine-turned à grains d’orge, satin finished chapter rings, Roman numerals for hours, Arabic for seconds dials, the two seconds dials for running seconds (left) and observation sections (right), sector below VI for state of wind, outer pearled minute ring with elongated blued steel Breguet hand, all chapters with crémaillère borders, Arabic 15-minute plaques, oval cartouche engraved Regulateur à Tourbillon, angled cartouche signed Breguet et Fils, secret signature twice signed Breguet to chapter ring between XI & I, secret inscription to Comte Alexis de Razoumoffsky to base of chapter ring

18ct gold Joly case, engine-turned back, bezel and band à grains d’orge, case back centred by small vacant circular cartouche, hidden hinge, pendant with quarter-turn piston for stop/start of observation seconds dial, polished gold cuvette, aperture for winding with directional arrow, signed Breguet No. 1890, number repeated to cuvette interior, case back interior numbered 1890 B and 1322, lozenge-shaped cartouche with bird above and pellet below J L J for Jean-Louis Joly, Paris assay and discharge marks comprising bear’s head facing left (3) in circular cartouche (3rd standard gold 750/1000) pecking cockerel (3) in oval cartouche (750/1000, 1798-1809), man’s head 85 excise mark

Measurements

diameter 65mm

depth including crystal 21mm

weight 202.2g

Accompaniments

with a Breguet 250th anniversary certificate

Frédéric Frackman to Count Alexis de Razoumoffsky 1809.

Christie’s 17 November 1954 purchased by Macolm Gardner on behalf of Courtenay Ilbert for 85 guineas.

Cecil Clutton purchased from Courtenay Ilbert 1954.

George Brown/Breguet purchased from Cecil Clutton circa 1960s.

Current collection purchased from George Brown/Breguet.

Daniels, George, The Art of Breguet, London & New York: Sotheby Parke, Bernet, 1975, p. 202.
Antiquarian Horology, Round the Sale Rooms, March 1955, Vol 1, No. 6, p. 85.
Reinhard Meis, Das Tourbillon, Munich: Laterna Magica, 1986, p. 375.
Keith Orford, A Watch with Breguet’s Échappement Naturel, Antiquarian Horology, Vol. 32, No. 1, March 2010, p. 65.
Cecil Clutton, Visits to Collections, Antiquarian Horology, No. 6 Vol. 2, 1958, pp. 107-108.
Cecil Clutton, Collector’s Collection, Monograph No. 8, London: Antiquarian Horological Society, 1974, p. 4.
Clutton, Cecil & Daniels, George, Watches, Third Ed., London: Philip Wilson for Sotheby Parke Bernet, 1979, figs. 214a-b.