Clocks · Clock
Clock no. 1200 by Reid & Auld
- Maker / attribution
- Reid & Auld (maker)
- Date
- c. 1820
- Historical period
- Precision & Scientific Horology (1750 – 1850)
- Country of origin
- Unrecorded in source
- Object type
- Clock
- Dimensions
- Overall: 330 x 190 x 103 mm
- Holding institution
- Royal Museums Greenwich
- Accession / object no.
- ZAA0723
- Credit line
- National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London, Foulkes Collection
- Catalogue title (original)
- 1200 (English)
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Record summary
Held and catalogued by Royal Museums Greenwich (object number ZAA0723), this is a clock by Reid & Auld, dated c. 1820. The Atlas places it in the Precision & Scientific Horology period (1750 – 1850) of its Clocks collection. Recorded dimensions: Overall: 330 x 190 x 103 mm. The record is illustrated with 1 photograph.
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
Catalogue description — Royal Museums Greenwich
A thirty-hour ebonised fruitwood mantel calendar timepiece by Reid & Auld, Edinburgh, No. 1200, c. 1820 The chain fusee movement with verge escapement is protected by a signed and numbered (1200) brass cover with shuttered winding and regulating squares. The movement, also signed and numbered. The potence plate is typical of any pocket watch of the period, having a pierced and chased balance cock and silver regulation disc. The pillar plate is considerably larger in diameter and carries the motion work and four-inch enamel dial. The year calendar is indicated on the outside of the dial, enclosing the minutes track and inner subsidiary hour, seconds and third subsidiary for moonphase and tidal indication. The arched case is surmounted by a single turned brass finial on a pagoda pediment over brass lion’s head carrying handles and ring turned half columns with blind brass fishscale frets and gadrooned tops on a bow sided stepped base fitted with brass claw feet. The front panel with brass stringing and raised panel with central quatrefoil inlay. Thomas Reid (1756-1831) born in Dysart, Fife was to become one of Scotland’s most celebrated clockmakers. Having completed an apprenticeship to Edinburgh watchmaker, James Cowan, in 1762 he went on to work in London for eleven years. At a time of very rapid advancement in the art of horology Reid accumulated knowledge and contacts that simply would not have been possible had he remained in Edinburgh. Upon the death of his former master he returned to Edinburgh to carry on the business. He took on his stepson, William Auld, as an apprentice who later became a partner in the business in 1806.
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
Domestic clocks
A clock combines four systems: a source of power (falling weight, coiled spring, or later electricity), a gear train that divides time, an escapement and oscillator that regulate it (foliot, pendulum or balance), and an indicating system of dial and hands or a bell. Its history runs from the large iron weight-driven clocks of the late thirteenth century to Renaissance spring-driven table clocks, the pendulum revolution of 1656, the factory clocks of the nineteenth century and electric and quartz clocks of the twentieth.
Domestic clocks also reflect regional furniture and decorative traditions — English longcase and bracket clocks, French pendules, Viennese regulators, Black Forest and American shelf clocks — and therefore record changing tastes as much as technical progress.
What to look for
- How the clock is powered: weights, spring barrel, fusee, electric coil.
- The oscillator: foliot, short pendulum, long seconds pendulum or balance.
- Whether it strikes: hour only (count wheel) or hours and quarters (rack striking).
- The maker or retailer's name on dial and movement, and any factory trademarks.
- Signs of alteration — replaced dials, converted escapements, 'married' cases.
Dating clues
- Before 1656 clocks used foliots or balances; after, most domestic clocks have pendulums.
- Anchor escapements spread after c. 1670; minute hands became common at the same time.
- Factory production in America and Germany transformed prices after c. 1840.
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) escapementFoliot
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