Important Watches

Geneva, Mar 20, 2010

LOT 179

Robin Detent Lever Escapement Robin Fils to the original design of Robert Robin, "Echa.nt de Robin In.te En 1791", the case with Paris control marks in use between 1809 and 1819. Very fine, extremely rare and important, silver and gold pocket watch with the detent lever escapement invented by Robert Robin in 1791, the only known complete surviving watch using the Robin escapement and bearing the Robin name.

CHF 30,000 - 45,000

USD 28,000 - 40,000 / EUR 20,000 - 30,000

Sold: CHF 32,400

C. Four-body, forme collier, No. 2519, mastermark SG, polished, flat band, the bezels yellow gold. Hinged gilt cuvette. D. White enamel by Borel, Breguet numerals, outer minute track, winding aperture at 9. Blued steel Breguet hands. M. 50 mm., matte gilt, with conical pillars, going-barrel passing through the back plate and secured by a gilt brass bridge engraved with foliate decoration, original Robin detent-lever escapement, plain three-arm balance, blued steel flat balance spring, gilt brass small cock with single foot only, with foliate engraved decoration and polished steel endplate, regulation arm on the edge with engraved scale on the backplate. Dial and movement signed Robin Fils, the back plate engraved : Echa.nt de Robin, In.te En 1791. Dial signed Borel on the reverse. Diam. 56 mm.


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Grading System
Grade:
Case: 2

Very good
Movement: 2

Very good
Dial: 2-01

Very good

HANDS Original

Notes

The present watch is the only known complete example to survive with Robin?s detent lever escapement and to bear the Robin name. The movement is identical to those made during Robert Robin?s lifetime, the only surviving example of which, a movement only, was sold by Antiquorum, Geneva, November 14, 2003, lot 113. The present watch is also signed similarly but with the addition of the signature "Robin Fils". It is therefore possible that the ebauche itself was made by Robert and then finished and sold by his son after 1809, or that his son made this watch to the exact design of his father?s of the 1790's. A similar movement, No. 48, from the Courtney Ilbert collection, in the British Museum, is dated 1807.