Lépine was the first maker in France to use Arabic numerals for the hours in place of the traditional Roman chapters. This watch is a good example of this new style of dial.
Jean-Antoine Lépine (1720-1814). He was born on 18 November 1720 at Challex, a small village a few kilometers north of Geneva. After having worked for some time at the establishment of Decrose, at the Grand Saconnex in the suburbs of Geneva, he arrived in Paris in 1744. A workman for André Charles Caron, King's Clockmaker, he married his employer's daughter in 1756 and was received Master in 1765. He was appointed "Horloger du Roi" (King's Clockmaker) about 1765. In 1766 he succeeded Caron, and appears on the list of Paris clockmakers of that year as: Jean-Antoine Lépine, Hger du Roy, rue Saint Denis, Place Saint Eustache. In 1772, Lépine established himself in the Place Dauphine, in 1778- 1779, Quai de l'Horloge du Palais, then in the rue des Fossés Saint Germain l'Auxerrois near the Louvre in 1781, and finally at 12 Place des Victoires in 1789. In 1782, his daughter Pauline married one of his workmen, Claude-Pierre Raguet, with whom he formed a partnership in 1792. In 1763 he invented a new repeating mechanism for watches, which was published in the Mémoires de l'Académie des Sciences in 1766. His new caliber, of a revolutionary conception, replacing the rear plate by bridges, was invented about 1770. The different moving parts could thenceforward be dismounted separately, which made maintenance and repair much easier. Also, the use of a dead-beat escapement, less sensitive to variations in the driving force than the recoil escapement hitherto in use, allowed him to suppress the fusee. This new layout was improved by Breguet who adopted it from 1790 for most of his watches. Lépine was responsible for a number of other inventions, one of them being the virgule escapement, a simplification of the double virgule escapement invented by his father-in-law and used by his brother-in-law Pierre Augustin Caron (who became famous under the name of Beaumarchais). He also developed a new form of case, ?à charnières perdues? (with concealed hinges) and a fixed bezel. Lépine remained faithful to his country of origin, and went often to the Gex countryside, more particularly to Ferney where Voltaire had set up a watch manufactory in 1770. Friendly relations were established between Lépine and the philosopher, and though we do not know the exact role he played in the Ferney manufactory, it seems that he had a hand in its organization. It is certain that he gave commissions to the workshops there until 1792. An unsigned memoir of 1784 reports that Lépine stayed in Ferney for 18 months, and that he had watch movements made there to a value of 90,000 livres a year. After his retirement in about 1793, although he had lost his sight, Lépine continued to be active in the firm managed by his son-in-law, and this until his death on 31 May 1814,at the age of 93.