Clocks · Bracket clock
Bracket clock by Robert Allam, London, c. 1765
- Maker / attribution
- Robert Allam (maker)
- Date
- c. 1765
- Historical period
- Precision & Scientific Horology (1750 – 1850)
- Country of origin
- England
- Place
- London
- Object type
- Bracket clock
- Dimensions
- Height 29 cm
- Stock no.
- SKU 361
- Credit line
- Dealer listing, Howard Walwyn (SKU 361)
- Catalogue title (original)
- ROBERT ALLAM. A very good and small Georgian period bracket clock (English)
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Record summary
Catalogued by Howard Walwyn Fine Antique Clocks (dealer), London (stock number SKU 361), this is a bracket clock by Robert Allam, made in London, England, dated c. 1765. The Atlas places it in the Precision & Scientific Horology period (1750 – 1850) of its Clocks collection. Recorded dimensions: Height 29 cm. The record is illustrated with 3 photographs.
Assembled from the source record's structured fields. Dates and attributions are given as the source states them; where a field is missing the Atlas leaves it blank rather than estimating.
Catalogue description
Dealer description — Howard Walwyn
A very good and small Georgian period mahogany bracket clock in an arched top case with fine brass mounts. The case is of traditional three pad style but of small proportions at only 11½ inches in height. Each pad is brass edged as are the front door and arched top side windows. All four corners have well chased, brass mounts, the base is brass banded to all four sides and the top moulding is inset with brass – a rare feature. The case stands on elegantly cast, bracket feet. The silvered engraved dial with mock pendulum aperture has a Roman chapter ring with outside five minutes and calendar to the inner edge. The delicately engraved signature is set in the centre. It has blued steel hour, minute, calendar and Strike/Silent hands. The five pillar fusee movement with scroll and leaf engraving to the backplate has knife edge verge escapement and a bob pendulum. The hours are sounded on a bell with pull hour repeat and strike/silent. Height : 11 ½ in (29 cm) excluding handle Width : 9 in (23 cm) including feet Depth : 7 ⅝ in (19.5 cm) including feet Robert Allam , apprenticed in 1730, was free of the Clockmakers’ Company from 1742 to 1765 and his work is always of fine quality. HW5944
Historical context
Precision & Scientific Horology (1750 – 1850)
Harrison solves longitude; Mudge invents the lever; Breguet's Paris workshop defines the modern watch.
The age of the deadbeat escapement, compensated pendulums and observatory regulators. Domestic clocks spread through the middle classes: English longcase and bracket clocks, French gilt-bronze mantel clocks, Viennese Biedermeier wall clocks, Black Forest painted-shield clocks, and the first American shelf clocks.
Read the period in the timelineMore clocks from this periodEarlier: Early Modern Horology
Atlas type guide
Bracket, table and spring-driven clocks
Spring-driven clocks freed timekeeping from the hanging weight. The coiled mainspring, documented from the fifteenth century, made portable table clocks possible; to even out its declining force, makers used the fusee, a conical pulley connected to the barrel by a gut line or chain. Renaissance table clocks from Augsburg and Nuremberg — drum-shaped, square or tower-shaped in gilt brass — were luxury scientific objects, often with astronomical dials and alarms.
After the pendulum, English makers developed the bracket clock: a wooden case with a carrying handle, a short pendulum with a verge escapement, and often repeating work to sound the hours on demand at night. Later examples use the anchor escapement. In the nineteenth century, 'table clock' became a broad term for spring clocks of every nationality.
What to look for
- A fusee in the movement (cone-shaped pulley) and the type of line — gut or chain.
- Verge escapement with a short bob pendulum, often with a decoratively engraved backplate.
- Repeat cords or buttons that make the clock strike again on demand.
- Gilt-brass engraved cases and horizontal dials on Renaissance pieces.
- Case shapes: inverted bell, bell top, break-arch, lancet or balloon.
Dating clues
- Drum and tower table clocks: c. 1520–1650.
- Ebony veneered English bracket clocks with verge escapements: c. 1670–1800.
- Engraved backplates were usual on English clocks until c. 1800, then generally plain.
General guidance written by the Atlas editors about this kind of object. It is not a statement about this particular piece; for that, rely on the source record above and on physical examination.
Read next:Anchor (recoil) escapement
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