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Omega 14ct lever hunter pocket watch, circa 1912 — view 1 of 1
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Pocket Watches · Pocket watch

Omega 14ct lever hunter pocket watch, circa 1912

DocumentedDocumented from an auction catalogue; attribution as stated by the auction house.
Maker / attribution
Unrecorded in source
Date
c. 1912
Country of origin
Unrecorded in source
Object type
Pocket watch
Dimensions
Diameter 50 mm
Lot
Sale 58, lot 889
Credit line
Auction lot record: lot 889, The Watch Auction - Pocket Watches & Accessories, Gardiner Houlgate (23rd October 2024)
Catalogue title (original)
Omega 14ct lever hunter pocket watch, signed movement, serial no. 40183xx, circa 1912, with compensated balance and regulator, metal cuvette, signed dial with Arabic numerals, minute markers and subsi (English)

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Record summary

Catalogued by Gardiner Houlgate (auction house), Corsham (lot Sale 58, lot 889), this is a pocket watch, dated c. 1912. The Atlas places it in the Golden Age of Mechanical Watchmaking period (1900 – 1945) of its Pocket Watches collection. Recorded dimensions: Diameter 50 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

Lot description — Gardiner Houlgate

Omega 14ct lever hunter pocket watch, signed movement, serial no. 40183xx, circa 1912, with compensated balance and regulator, metal cuvette, signed dial with Arabic numerals, minute markers and subsidiary seconds, Louis style hands, within a good signed engine turned case, case no. 5160957, 74.3gm, 50mm

Historical context

Golden Age of Mechanical Watchmaking (1900 – 1945)

The wristwatch displaces the pocket watch; waterproof cases, self-winding and grand complications.

The pocket watch reached technical maturity and then began to give way to the wristwatch after the First World War. Complicated watches for collectors such as Henry Graves Jr. and James Ward Packard, railroad watches, and slim Art Deco dress watches are characteristic.

Read the period in the timelineMore pocket watches from this periodEarlier: Industrial Revolution

Atlas type guide

Hunter, half-hunter and open-face watches

In the nineteenth century the pocket watch case settled into a few standard forms. The hunter (French savonnette) has a hinged front lid protecting the crystal — reputedly for riders who could not risk broken glass — and is opened by pressing the crown or a push-piece. The half-hunter has a small window in the lid so the hands can be read when closed. The open-face (lépine) watch has no front cover, with the crown at 12; hunters normally carry the crown at 3.

Case types also changed with winding: key-wound watches gave way to keyless (stem-wound) mechanisms after Adrien Philippe's and others' designs of the 1840s, with pendant setting or lever setting.

What to look for

  • Crown position relative to the seconds dial: at 3 for hunters, at 12 for open-face watches.
  • Spring-loaded front cover with a push-piece in the pendant.
  • Half-hunter chapter ring enamelled on the lid.
  • Key holes in the inner dome (cuvette) versus keyless winding.

Dating clues

  • Keyless winding spread after c. 1850 and became standard by c. 1890.
  • English hallmarks inside gold and silver cases give the year of assay.

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:Detached lever escapement

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