Italian horology

Medieval public clocks

A public clock in Milan struck the hours by around 1336, and Italian cities competed for prestigious tower clocks.

Dondi's Astrarium

Giovanni de' Dondi completed his Astrarium in 1364: a seven-faced astronomical clock showing the Sun, Moon and five planets, with a perpetual calendar of movable feasts, described in his Tractatus astrarii.

Galileo

Galileo's study of the pendulum and his 1641 design for a pendulum escapement, partly built by his son Vincenzo, prepared the way for Huygens. Italian night clocks with illuminated dials were made in Rome in the 17th century.

Night clocks and the Campani brothers

In 17th-century Rome the brothers Giuseppe, Matteo and Pietro Tommaso Campani made silent night clocks in which a lamp behind a pierced dial lit the hour numerals as they travelled across a semicircular scale; Pietro Tommaso devised a silent escapement for one made for Pope Alexander VII. Matteo also claimed a pendulum clock of his own design, and Giuseppe was celebrated for telescope lenses.

Italian hours and later centres

Until the late 18th century many Italian clocks counted 'Italian hours', numbering 24 hours from sunset, and six-hour dials, with the numerals I–VI repeated, were widespread in Italy. Milan, Turin and Venice had clock and watch trades in the 18th and 19th centuries, and in the 20th century Panerai of Florence supplied diving instruments and watches to the Italian navy.

Timeline

1. 10 BCEAugustus erects an Egyptian obelisk as the gnomon of a giant sundial in Rome
2. c. 1336A public clock in Milan strikes each of the 24 hours
3. 1364Giovanni de' Dondi completes the Astrarium, a seven-faced astronomical clock — Giovanni de' Dondi
4. 1574Second astronomical clock of Strasbourg Cathedral completed by Dasypodius and the Habrecht brothers
5. c. 1583 (traditional)Galileo observes the isochronism of a swinging lamp in Pisa — Pendulum
6. 1641Galileo designs a pendulum clock escapement, partly built by his son Vincenzo