Exceptional Collectors Timepieces, Ho...

Geneva, May 15, 2005

LOT 103

France. Made circa 1580. Fine and very rare miniature striking gilt brass weight driven wall clock with alarm.

CHF 50,000 - 70,000

EUR 32,000 - 45,000 / USD 43,000 - 60,000

Sold: CHF 66,700

C. Rectangular lantern form, flanked by part reeded, part fluted columns of square section, moulded base onlion's paw feet, the side panels with hinged central doors and engraved with masks and scroling foliage on ahatched ground, the dial plate en suite and the back panel centered with the initials A.G. and I.H.S. incorporatedwith a cross. Moulded top surmounted with a pierced and engraved dome over the bell and flanked by fourrampant lions, turned vase finial, fixed loop and wall spikes, brass-clad lead weights. D. Silver chapter ring withengraved Roman numerals and half-hour arrow divisions. Single gilt brass hand. M. Three-bar in line with addi-tionalbars at right angles for mounting the gilt count-wheel and alarm-setting disc. Part gilt trains with serratedsteel drums for the ropes. Three-wheel going train with verge escapement, single-arm brass balance with sprunglever to lift the verge and disengage the pallets for setting to time. Simple C scroll cock. Striking train with fourblade solid fly, the count-wheel with internal hour division slots and driven off the great wheel by a transversemounted wheel with turret pinion. Alarm train with constantly engaged hour disc calibrated with Arabic numer-als,with friction-tight setting disc with a detent for releasing the transverse mounted locking arm. Crown wheeland verge controller with double-ended hammer. Both trains striking on a cloche bell.Dim. 150 x 75 x 75 mm.


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Grading System
Grade:
Case: 3

Good
Movement: 3 - 22*
Dial: 3 - 01

Notes

The present lot was previously sold by Antiquorum, The Art of French Horology, Nov. 14, 1993, lot 6. A very similar clock was formerly in the Paul Garnier Collection, and is now in the Louvre, Paris, Inv. No. 7017. Literature: G. Migeon, ?Collection Paul Garnier?, Paris, 1917, pp. 87-88, pl. XLIII, and Tardy ?La Pendule Francaise?, Vol.I, Paris, 1981, p 49. Three examples of miniature wall clocks (including this lot) and an empty case are known to have survived, all of virtu-ally identical construction and therefore attributable to the same unknown maker. Migeon describes Garnier's clock as being of either French or Italian origin, and indeed it is difficult to state with certainty from which area of France they originated. In form they are similar to many of the clocks produced in the latter part of the 16th Century, but the major-ity of surviving examples are spring driven. It has been suggested that they may have been made in France for the Italian market.