88,500 CHF
Palemon and Lavinia LeRoy, Swiss, No. 2115, movement attributed to Piguet & Meylan. Made for the Chinese market, circa 1825. Very fine and rare, musical and quarter-repeating, 18K gold, polychrome enamel and pearl-set, centerseconds pocket watch playing music on the hour or at will. Four-body, bassine, the back with a finely painted on enamel scene depicting Lavinia receiving the letter, the bezels with two waves of azure and translucent red enamel set with graduated pearls, pearl-set pendant and bow, bolt on the band for start/stop of the music. Hinged gold cuvette decorated with blue and white champlevé enamel foliage, apertures for hand-setting, winding the music and going train. White enamel, radial Roman numerals, outer minute and seconds divisions with fifteen-minute Arabic numerals. Gilt fleur de lis hands. 50 mm., frosted gilt, standing barrels, cylinder escapement, three-arm gold balance, flat balance spring, polished steel endplate, index regulator, music with double-pinned disk and 20 blued steel tuned teeth playing on both sides, music/silence lever protruding from under the cuvette, repeating on gongs activated by depressing the pendant. Dial signed, movement numbered. Diam. 57 mm. Notes This painting illustrates a story from James Thomson’s popular poems "The Seasons" dating from 1726–30. The rural lovers Palemon and Lavinia appear in Thomson’s "Autumn"; they are adapted from the Biblical story of Ruth and Boaz. Palemon, a gentleman, professes his love
Auctioneer:
Antiquorum
Date:
2007-11-11
