48,300 HKD
CHt. Moricand à Genève, circa 1810.Fine and very rare silver pocket thermometer with built-in watch. Three-body Empire with reeded band, the engine-turned back with eccentric small dial aperture. White enamel on the front with Arabic Reaumur thermometer ring and small half-moon Fast/Slow regulator sector. Small eccentric white enamel with Breguet numerals on the rear side. Blued steel Breguet hands. Gilt brass engraved with military trophies, the bimetallic curb driving the thermometer hand by means of a rack and pinion. Watch movement: Small eccentric gilt brass full plate with cylindrical pillars, fusee with chain, verge escapement, plain brass three-arm balance, flat balance sprng. Gilt brass continental balance cock with polished steel end-piece.Signed on the dial.Diam. 64 mm. Notes Silver bimetallic pocket chronometers were first made by Frédéric Houriet, followed by Breguet and Urban Jürgensen. A few were produced in Switzerland by other makers but no other thermometer of this type, also fitted with a watch movement, is known to exist.According to Osvaldo Patrizzi, Dictionnaire des Horlogers Genevois, Antiquorum Editions, Geneva 1998, Christ Moricand worked in Geneva in the rue des Corps-Saints, circa 1810 and in partnership with his son from 1815.
Auctioneer:
Antiquorum
Date:
2000-06-05