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Auction 108
Lot 306

108th Auction

2023/5/20

Lot 306

Jacques Goullons

A very fine Parisian one-handed coach clock with half hour/hour strike and alarm

estimated
22.000—35.000 €
Price realized
-
specific features
Case
Silver, the rim openwork and elaborately engraved, rear bell.
Dial
Enamel chapter ring, central silver alarm disc with engraved summer flowers, single blued steel hand.
Movement
Full plate movement, chain/fusee, two barrels for alarm and hour strike with open work decoration and floral engravings, 2 hammers, verge escapement, locking plate, ratchet wheel set up with blued steel spring, four-arm brass balance.
Diam.115 mm
Circa1650
Ctry.France
Wt.1370 g


This timepiece was updated shortly after Christian Huygens invented the balance spring in 1675. In the course of this a cock and a regulator for the balance spring were made towards the end of the 17th century.
To emphasise the beautiful strike, the edge of the case is openwork and ornamented with a band of lillies, daffodils and sunflowers. There are also two putti and a cartouche with the portrait of a military commander wearing a laurel wreath, which is flanked by two more putti and cornucopiae; the pendant is decorated with two warriors in chains and some military equipment.
Provenance: sold at Antiquorum auction on October 16, 1994, lot 405.


Jacques Goullons was an important Parisian clockmaker, active between 1625 and about 1660. He worked as a watchmaker at the court of Gaston, Duke of Orléans (1608-1660), brother of King Louis XIII (1601-1643), and later probably also for Philip, Duke of Orléans (1640-1701), brother of King Louis XIV (1638-1715). Jacques Goullons specialised in making movements for pocket watches with enamelled cases; among his works is a watch for Louis XIV, which is now part of the Robert Lehman Collection at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. This focus by Goullons is not surprising, as Gaston, Duke of Orléans was known, among other things, as the patron of a successful group of enamellers who worked in Blois, the Duke's residence.
The Musée International d'Horlogerie at La Chaux-de-Fonds owns a watch by Goullons. The Victoria und Albert Museum in London has a marvellous ornamental watch with portraits of Louis XIII and Cardinal Richelieu and the Worshipful Company of Clockmakers owns a watch made by Goullons, which is decorated with enamel flowers and leaves. Jacques Goullons died in August 1671.