French horology

Renaissance and the royal court

Blois, a seat of the French court in the 16th and early 17th centuries, was an important early centre of watchmaking, alongside Paris and Lyon. Enamelled cases from Blois are among the finest of the period.

Science and the Académie

In the 18th century French horology became closely tied to science. Julien and Pierre Le Roy, Ferdinand Berthoud and the Lepaute family made regulators and marine clocks; Pierre Le Roy's detent escapement and compensation balance (1748–1766) anticipated the modern chronometer. Jean-Antoine Lépine's bar calibre (c. 1770) allowed much thinner watches.

Breguet and Paris

Abraham-Louis Breguet, a Neuchâtel-born watchmaker working in Paris from 1775, introduced the overcoil balance spring, the tourbillon, perpétuelle self-winding watches and the 'souscription' watch, and established a style of hands, dials and cases still imitated.

Industry

From 1793 Swiss watchmakers settled in Besançon, which became the centre of the French watch industry; Morez and the Haut-Jura specialised in comtoise clocks, and Saint-Nicolas-d'Aliermont in carriage clocks and precision instruments.

Timeline

1. 1574Second astronomical clock of Strasbourg Cathedral completed by Dasypodius and the Habrecht brothers
2. 1673Huygens publishes Horologium Oscillatorium — Christiaan Huygens
3. 1748Pierre Le Roy invents the detent escapement — Pierre Le Roy
4. 1766Pierre Le Roy presents his marine timekeeper with detent escapement and compensation balance — Pierre Le Roy
5. c. 1770Jean-Antoine Lépine introduces the bar calibre, making thinner watches possible — Jean-Antoine Lépine
6. 1775Abraham-Louis Breguet opens his workshop in Paris — Breguet
7. 1795Breguet introduces the overcoil balance spring — Balance spring (hairspring)
8. 1801Breguet patents the tourbillon — Tourbillon
9. 1810–1812Breguet makes a bracelet watch for Caroline Murat, Queen of Naples — Breguet
10. 1816Louis Moinet's 'compteur de tierces', the earliest known chronograph — Louis Moinet
11. 1821Nicolas Rieussec's inking chronograph times horse races in Paris — Chronograph
12. 1842Adrien Philippe invents crown winding and setting (patented 1845) — Keyless (stem) winding
13. 1896Charles-Édouard Guillaume discovers Invar, a nickel steel almost unaffected by heat
14. 1904Cartier designs the Santos wristwatch for aviator Alberto Santos-Dumont — Cartier