Meyrenne

Meyrenne, (Geneva), circa 1700. Very fine silver pair-cased single-hand watch with alarm. Outer: two-body, back chased with exotic birds and flowers,band pierced and engraved with inhabited foliage and repousséwith four portraits, bezel pierced, engraved and chased withstylized foliage and flowers. Inner: two-body, "bassine" withdeep back, polished back with winding apertures, band piercedand engraved with foliage and two rampant lions. Silver ring,bold champlevé radial Roman numerals, inner quarter-hourring, central silver alarm disc with Arabic numerals and brassfleur-de-lis pointer indicating hours, blued steel "fleur-de-lis"alarm setting hand. 42 mm, hinged, gilt full plate withEgyptian pillars, fusee and chain, verge escapement with brassbalance and short balance spring, single-footed cock with semi-circularaperture for mock pendulum (now missing), alarm withfixed engraved barrel and steel train, striking on a bell withboth sides of short Notes The watch was made by Alexandre Meyranne (also Meyrenne or Meyronne). He was a French Protestant from Grenoble who, after the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes (1685), went first to Lancy, near Geneva, and subsequently to Neuchâtel, around 1687. The son of a watchmaker also named Alexander Meyronne, in 1698 Alexander Meyronne the younger married Marie Girard.