Important Collectors’ Wristwatches, P...

Geneva, Nov 16, 2008

LOT 497

Robin Escapement Lepaute, H.ger de l?Empereur, a Paris, No. 1794. Dated June 1810. Very fine and extremely rare, quarter-repeating, silver and gold pocket watch with Robin escapement.

CHF 13,000 - 16,000

USD 12,000 - 15,000 / EUR 8,200 - 10,000

Sold: CHF 17,400

C. Four-body, silver, ?forme collier?, gold bezel and rim, No. 3061, mastermark JBM, the back engine-turned with a sunray pattern, fluted band. Hinged silver cuvette. D. White enamel by Lucard, Breguet numerals, outer minute track and Arabic 15-minute numerals. Blued steel Breguet hands. M. 54 mm., matte gilt, cylindrical pillars, fusee and chain, the barrel with detachable bridge, maintaining power, Robin escapement with visible brass escape wheel, steel lever with banking post projecting into a hole in the backplate, three-arm brass balance, blued steel flat balance spring, bimetallic temperature compensation curb on the index regulator, fan-shaped balance cock with ruby endstone, repeating on flat gongs activate by depressing the pendant, repeat remontoire spring with exposed barrel under a detachable bridge. Dial, cuvette and movement signed. Diam. 60 mm.


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Grading System
Grade: AAA

Excellent
Case: 3

Good
Movement: 3**

Good

Repair required, at buyer's expense
Dial: 3-25-01

Good

Chipped

HANDS Original

Notes

Robert Robin (1741-1799) became Marchand-Horloger Privilégié du Roi on 22 October 1763 and resigned on 13 September 1765 in favor of Jean-Pierre Courtois. In 1778 the Académie des Sciences approved two of his inventions, one being an astronomical clock representing a meridian drawn on a pyramid, which the Menus Plaisirs acquired that year for Louis XIV, for 30,000 livres. During the same period he perfected his famous mantel clocks with astronomical indications and compensated pendulums, one of the first owners being the Marquis de Courtanvaux. Robin applied these principles to regulators; the duc d'Aumont possessed an early model of this kind. Robin was equally interested in watches, using a special escapement from 1786 onwards, and in monumental clocks, supplying the Grand Commun at Versailles (1782), the Menus Plaisirs, and the Petit Trianon (1785). Many members of Parisian high society were clients of Robin, including the maréchaux ducs of Duras and Richelieu, and the marquis de Sérent, tutor to the dukes of Angoulême and Berry.
Literature: La Montre Française, Adolphe Chapiro, Les Editions de l?Amateur, 1991, pp. 289, fig. 579 & 580, ?Les Ouvriers du Temps?, by Jean- Dominique Augarde, Antiquorum Editions, 1996.