Pocket Watches · Pocket watch
Pearl and Diamond Set Irish Verge with Chatelaine, circa 1785
- Maker / attribution
- Unrecorded in source
- Date
- c. 1785
- Historical period
- Precision & Scientific Horology (1750 – 1850)
- Country of origin
- United Kingdom
- Object type
- Pocket watch
- Stock no.
- A11018
- Credit line
- Dealer listing, Pieces of Time (A11018)
- Catalogue title (original)
- Pearl and Diamond Set Irish Verge with Chatelaine (English)
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Record summary
Catalogued by Pieces of Time (dealer), London (stock number A11018), this is a pocket watch, made in United Kingdom, dated c. 1785. The Atlas places it in the Precision & Scientific Horology period (1750 – 1850) of its Pocket Watches collection. The record is illustrated with 5 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
A late 18 th Century Irish verge in a fine pearl and diamond set gold and enamel case with matching macaroni chatelaine. Full plate fire gilt movement with fusee and chain. Diamond endstone to the gilt cock pierced and engraved in a geometric design, silver regulator disc. Plain three arm steel balance, blue steel spiral hairspring. Winding through the white enamel dial with radially set Arabic numerals, decorative white metal hands (lacking stones). Fine gold consular case set with diamonds and pearls. The bezels set with a single row of large split pearls. The back covered with translucent dark blue enamel over a radially engine turned ground. The centre with deep decoration surmounted by diamond within a diamond set border on a gold mounted translucent dark blue enamel disc. This is in turn mounted above a row of large split pearls in a gold setting. Long matching macaroni gold and enamel chatelaine. Central chain of small octagonal gold links decorated on both sides with translucent dark blue enamel bordered by white enamel and terminating in a gold spring clip with threaded safety collar. Flanking this are two further gold chains. Oval cartouche of two gold frames enamelled on both sides and joined with pearls. Attached are two short matching chains and two gold and enamel bells with tassels of gold cones. Later red morocco covered presentation case lined with gray velvet, folding easel stand.
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
Verge and pair-cased watches
After Christiaan Huygens and Robert Hooke applied the balance spring around 1675, the verge watch became a reasonably reliable timekeeper and the minute hand became standard. Through the eighteenth century the typical English watch was a pair-cased verge: a fusee movement with a pierced, engraved balance cock, housed in an inner case and a separate protective outer case, often of repoussé gold, shagreen, tortoiseshell or enamel.
French watches of the same period were thicker 'oignons', later replaced by elegant thinner watches following Jean-Antoine Lépine's bar-bridge calibre of c. 1770. Dutch, Swiss and German makers supplied international markets, and verge watches were made until the mid-nineteenth century as cheaper alternatives to the cylinder and lever.
What to look for
- The pierced balance cock on the backplate: winged (continental) or with a foot (English); its style dates the watch.
- Fusee and chain visible through the movement; key winding through the dial (early) or case back.
- Hallmarks inside English silver or gold cases, which give a date letter.
- Maker's name and serial number engraved on the backplate; watch papers inside outer cases.
- Enamel dials (after c. 1720) versus earlier champlevé metal dials.
Dating clues
- Champlevé dials: c. 1680–1730; white enamel dials thereafter.
- English case hallmarks give the year of assay to within a year.
- Verge watches persisted in cheap production until c. 1850.
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:Verge escapement
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