Lot 693

Johann Zeidler, Graßlitz, 45 mm, 51 g, circa 1800
A unique double-sided verge pocket watch with date and ivory movement
Case: 8k pink gold/ivory. Dial: enamel. Movm.: ivory, full plate movement, keywind, chain/fusee, three-arm brass balance, ivory balance bridge pierced and engraved with double-headed eagle.
The pink gold case is decorated with engine-turned geometric pattern and has glass panels on both sides to reveal the magnificent ivory movement. Particularly striking are the ivory fusee and the finely pierced ivory balance bridge with the engraved double-headed eagle of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
Pocket watches with ivory movements are extremely rare and most likely would have been produced in Central Europe during the same time period Central Europe. Regrettably, most of these watches are unsigned.
In 1996 Antiquorum sold two of the few existing ivory watches, one of them with an ivory balance bridge decorated with the engraved coat of arms of Napoleon’s wife, Joséphine de Beauharnais (1763-1814). Unfortunately that watch was also unsigned. Another ivory pocket watch with a triangular, visible balance and eccentric dial is held in a German private collection.
The watch we have here bears a similarly fine decoration and is signed by watchmaker Johann Zeidler of Grasslitz near the Saxon border in today’s Czech Republic.
According to Jürgen Abeler, Johann Zeidler of Grasslitz, a town in the Karlovy Vary Region of the Czech Republic, created five of these watches. Today such unique pieces are held by important museums such as the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna, where a pocket watch movement from the property of Emperor Francis II is kept.