A Daniel Quare silver and tortoiseshell pair case verge escapement watch, gilt fullplate movement with fusee, large pierced and engraved balance cock. Verge escapement. The fullplate signed Quare London, with serial number 107. The silver dial with gilt engraved edge and Roman numerals for the hours and outer Arabic minutes, beetle and poker hands. Centre engraved and signed. The inner case signed 'Im' with winding hole. The outer case in tortoiseshell with silver pique riveting at bezel, culminating in a riveted foliate decorative pattern to rear. London, circa 1690. Diameter: 54 mm. Provenance: Sotheby's, 15th December 1983, lot 46, the collection of Dr Trevor Hyde, Sydney, acquired from the above, Literature: for Notes on the significance of Quare, and a similar watch in the Pierpont Morgan collection, New York refer to F.J. Britten, old clocks and watches & their makers, 3rd Ed. This example predates the earliest repeater serial number listed in G. H. Baillie, Watchmakers and Clockmakers of the world, 2013. Other Notes: Daniel Quare was a watchmaker, known best for inventing an early repeating watch movement in 1680. He was also an early proponent of the use of a minute hand actuated alongside the hour hand. Admitted as a brother, and later master of the Clockmakers' Company in 1708. He famously made a number of important watches for William III and George I. A very similar silver and pique tortoiseshell watch by Quare is in the Pierpont Morgan collection, New York, dating to circa 1690.
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- Pique Work - A decorative technique used on jewellery and small decorative objects in which designs are created by inlaying small gold or silver studs and stips into tortoiseshell. The art reached its highest point in 17th- and 18th-century France, particularly for the decoration of small tortoiseshell articles such as combs, patch boxes, and snuffboxes.
- Foliate - Decorated with leaves or leaf-like forms.
- Tortoiseshell - Tortoiseshell is a translucent material that comes from the horny carapace of a certain types of turtles, including the hawksbill turtle. It is often therefore mounted on a colour underground - often red - or inlaid with gold or silver thread, as seen in Boulle furniture.
The texture and colour nuances of the material are extremely important. Heated tortoiseshell can easily be formed into various shapes. Like other natural materials, tortoiseshell becomes more beautiful with use. In a time before plastic, tortoiseshell was widely used for small objects such as combs and powder compacts.
In 1973, the trade of tortoiseshell worldwide was banned under CITES (The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species). Prior to importing or exporting items containing tortoiseshell a CITES permit must be obtained. Tortoiseshell items cannot be traded on Ebay.
"Faux tortoiseshell", another case of man initiating nature, is made from old-style plastics such as celluloid and cellulos and is coloured with red, yellow and brown spots to imitate the genuine article. It is commonly used in glasses frames, musical instruments and costume jewellery.
- Fusee - The fusee movement was used in clocks and pocket watches from the mid 17th century. The fusee is a cone shaped drum within the works that is linked to the barrel of the spring, usually by a length of chain.
As the mainspring loses its tension over time, the cone shaped barrel compensates for this by increasing the tension, by pulling the mainspring tighter, thus ensuring the time remains constant.
Use of the fusee in clocks was superseded by the "going barrel" in the mid 19th century and for pocket watches at the beginning of the 19th century.
The fusee continued to be used in marine chronometers until the 1970s.
- Verge Escapement - A verge escapement is an early mechanical escapement used in clocks and other timekeeping devices. It is an early form of the escapement mechanism, which is used to regulate the movement of the hands of a clock or watch. The verge escapement consists of a vertical shaft called the verge, which is mounted on the clock's main plate. Attached to the verge are two pallets, which engage with the teeth of the escape wheel. As the escape wheel turns, the pallets alternately lock and release it, allowing the movement of the clock to be regulated. The verge escapement was widely used in early mechanical clocks, but it was eventually replaced by the more accurate and reliable anchor escapement.
- Bezel - On a clock or watch, the bezel is the metal frame into which the watch or clock glass is fitted. In clocks, the bezel may include a hinge and a flange, in effect a door to the face of the clock. In jewellery the bezel is a band of metal with a projecting lip that holds the gemstone in its setting.
- Movement - The technical name for the workings of a clock or watch, and does not include the dial or case.
- Circa - A Latin term meaning 'about', often used in the antique trade to give an approximate date for the piece, usually considered to be five years on either side of the circa year. Thus, circa 1900 means the piece was made about 1900, probably between 1895 and 1905. The expression is sometimes abbreviated to c.1900.
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