Pocket Watches · Pocket watch
Gold Quarter Repeating Swiss Automaton, circa 1820
- Maker / attribution
- Unrecorded in source
- Date
- c. 1820
- Historical period
- Precision & Scientific Horology (1750 – 1850)
- Country of origin
- Switzerland
- Object type
- Pocket watch
- Materials / technique
- gold
- Stock no.
- A11032
- Credit line
- Dealer listing, Pieces of Time (A11032)
- Catalogue title (original)
- Gold Quarter Repeating Swiss Automaton (English)
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Record summary
Catalogued by Pieces of Time (dealer), London (stock number A11032), this is a pocket watch, made in Switzerland, dated c. 1820. The Atlas places it in the Precision & Scientific Horology period (1750 – 1850) of its Pocket Watches collection. Materials and techniques recorded by the source: gold. 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 — Pieces of Time
An early 19 th Century Swiss quarter repeating verge automaton in a gold open face case. Full plate gilt fusee movement. Finely pierced and engraved bridge cock, polished steel endstone in a polished steel setting. Plain three arm gilt balance with blue steel spiral hairspring. Silver regulator dial with blue steel indicator. Pendant quarter repeating on two gongs. Silver ring dial with Roman numerals, gilt Breguet hands. Within the dial two gilt chased and engraved classical figures fixed above the plate and polished steel repeating work. As the watch strikes the hours and quarters the arms of the figures move as though striking the bells between them. Plain gold open face case, gold push pendant for the repeat, wound through the sprung gilt cuvette. Your browser does not support the video tag.
Historical context
Precision & Scientific Horology (1750 – 1850)
Harrison solves longitude; Mudge invents the lever; Breguet's Paris workshop defines the modern watch.
From 1750 to 1850 the watch became a precision instrument. Mudge's lever escapement, the cylinder escapement, Lépine's thin bar calibre, Breguet's innovations (overcoil, tourbillon, perpétuelle) and the pocket chronometer of Arnold and Earnshaw all date from this period, while verge watches remained common in cheaper production.
Read the period in the timelineMore pocket watches from this periodEarlier: Early Modern Horology
Atlas type guide
Repeating watches
Before electric light, telling the time in the dark was a real problem. Repeating watches strike the time on demand when a slide or push-piece is operated: quarter repeaters sound hours and quarters, minute repeaters hours, quarters and minutes. Edward Barlow and Daniel Quare disputed the invention in London in the 1680s. Early repeaters struck on a bell inside the case; Abraham-Louis Breguet introduced the gong (a coiled steel wire) around 1780, allowing thinner watches.
Repeaters require a separate train with racks, snails and a governor to control the striking speed, and are among the most demanding complications to make and adjust. Swiss makers of the Vallée de Joux specialised in repeating ébauches in the nineteenth century.
What to look for
- A slide on the case band or a push-piece through the pendant.
- Gongs encircling the movement (after c. 1780) or a bell in the case (earlier); pierced case for sound.
- The racks, snails and governor visible under the dial or on the movement.
- Terms such as 'Minutes', 'Quarts' or 'Répétition' on the dial or cuvette.
Dating clues
- Bell-striking quarter repeaters: c. 1690–1800.
- Gong repeaters and dumb repeaters (striking on the case): after c. 1780.
- Minute repeaters became more common after c. 1830 with Vallée de Joux ébauches.
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:Minute repeater
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