Important Modern & Vintage Timepieces

Geneva, May 13, 2012

LOT 329

LOUIS AUDEMARS KING UMBERTO I OF ITALY PRESENTATION WATCH WITH SIX COMPLICATIONS Louis Audemars, Brassus & Genève, ?Quantieme Perpetuel Phase de Lune Repetition Minutes?, case No. 0252. Made for Umberto I, King of Italy, retailed by Victor Fleury, Hger de la Marine, 23 Rue de la Paix, Paris, circa 1890. Extremely fine and very rare, minute-repeating, 18K rose gold, champlevé enamel and diamond-set, keyless Royal presentation pocket watch with perpetual calendar, moon phases and lunar calendar.

CHF 30,000 - 50,000

USD 33,000 - 55,000 / EUR 25,000 - 40,000

Sold: CHF 79,300

C. Four body, bassine, polished, the back cover with the champlevé enameled diamond-set coat of arms of Umberto I, King of Italy. Hinged gold cuvette engraved with the technical details. D. White enamel with radial Roman numerals, outer minute track with Arabic fi ve-minute numerals, subsidiary dials for the seconds, date, days of the week and months with leap-year cycle, aperture for the moon phases with lunar calendar on the edge. Gold spade hands. M. 19"', matte gilt brass, 25 jewels, counterpoised straight line lever escapement, cut bimetallic compensation balance, blued steel Breguet balance spring, index regulator, repeating on gongs with two polished steel hammers, activated by a slide in the band. Cuvette signed by the retailer. Diam. 53 mm.


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Grading System
Grade:
Case: 3

Good
Movement: 3*

Good

Overhaul recommended, at buyer's expense
Dial: 3-01

Good

HANDS Original

Notes

The present watch would appear to be the most complicated of those made by Louis Audemars for King Umberto I to be offered at auction. These watches were commissioned by the King in order to be presented to important visitors or in recognition of loyalty. Other watches by Louis Audemars for King Umberto were sold by Antiquorum in Geneva on April 2, 2006, lot 486 and March 20, 2010, lot 85. Vacheron & Constantin and Patek Philippe also made such watches for King Umberto.
King Umberto I (1844-1900) Was born on March 14, 1844, in Turin (Piedmont), Kingdom of Sardinia, Duke of Savoy and King of Italy. His marriage to his cousin Margherita Teresa Giovanna, Princess of Savoy, on April 22, 1868, and the birth of their son, the future Vittorio Emanuele III, on November 11, 1869, also gained him public sympathy in spite of prevailing antimonarchist sentiment. Umberto I led his country out of its isolation and into the Triple Alliance with Austria and Germany. He supported nationalistic and imperialistic policies that led to disaster for Italy and helped create the atmosphere in which he was assassinated in Monza by an anarchist on July 29, 1900.