Clocks · Miniature clock
Minature table clock in gilt-metal with Altenstetter enamels, probably made in Augsburg, 1680-1699
- Maker / attribution
- Unrecorded in source
- Date
- 1575-1600
- Historical period
- Renaissance Horology (1400 – 1600)
- Country of origin
- Germany
- Place
- Augsburg
- Object type
- Miniature clock
- Materials / technique
- Silver and silver gilt with enamels, brass base and dome.
- Dimensions
- Height: 8.5 cm; Width: 3.5 cm; Depth: 3.2 cm
- Holding institution
- Victoria and Albert Museum, London
- Accession / object no.
- 617-1864
Record summary
Held and catalogued by Victoria and Albert Museum, London (object number 617-1864), this is a miniature clock, made in Augsburg, Germany, dated 1575-1600. The Atlas places it in the Renaissance Horology period (1400 – 1600) of its Clocks collection. Materials and techniques recorded by the source: Silver and silver gilt with enamels, brass base and dome. Recorded dimensions: Height: 8.5 cm; Width: 3.5 cm; Depth: 3.2 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
V&A — Summary
This miniature clock may have been made for a collector's cabinet, in which technical virtuosity would have been valued as much as artistic creativity. The translucent enamel plaques on the face and sides of this clock are of a kind associated with the Augsburg goldsmith David Altenstetter (master 1572, died 1617).
V&A — Physical description
Case: Case of tabernacle form, with flat brass base and bun feet; the front, rear and hinged side-plates of silver with scrolls and foliage inset in translucent enamel. At the top, surrounded by four finials, an arcaded gallery surmounted by a moulded brass dome with a fifth finial. Dial: Chapter-ring 2.2 cm diameter, with Roman hours and half-hour marks. Simple iron hand. Movement: Running train only, with all wheels of brass. Now with a restin-barrel and a spring wound through a pair of gears, but formerly with a pulley for weight drive, and now with corresponding holes in the bottom plate. Verge escapement, steel balance-wheel with corresponding holes in the bottom plate. Verge escapement, steel balance-wheel.
V&A — Object history
Received from Van Cuyck, Paris. Purchased April 20th 1864 for £20.00.
V&A gallery label
Silver Gallery: The translucent enamel plaques on the face and sides of this tiny clock are of a kind particularly associated with the Augsburg goldsmith David Altenstetter (master 1572, died 1617).
Historical context
Renaissance Horology (1400 – 1600)
Spring power makes clocks portable; Nuremberg and Augsburg produce the first watches; the Prague Orloj is built.
Spring power made the domestic clock portable. Augsburg and Nuremberg produced gilt-brass table clocks, often with astronomical dials and alarms; weight-driven Gothic wall clocks and English lantern clocks served households. Clocks of this period have foliot or balance-wheel control and usually only an hour hand.
Read the period in the timelineMore clocks from this periodEarlier: Medieval Period
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:FuseeAnchor (recoil) escapement
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