Lot 422

Mikhail Semyonovitch Bronnikov, 41 mm, 21 g, circa 1865
A unique pocket watch entirely made of bone, with original carved bone chain, hook and key. According to the consignor, the material used here is mammoth bone
Case: probably mammoth bone, moulded, hinged back cover with cyrillic monogram and engraved mitre. Dial: bone with Arabic numerals on circular cartouches, auxiliary seconds, bone hands. Movm.: entirely made of bone with bone bridges, keywind, bone train and going barrel, cylinder escapement, plain bone three-arm balance.
The Bronnikov family is famous for their wooden watches but they also created some bone watches, which are even rarer than the wooden timepieces. Hardly any of the small number of bone watches they produced have survived until today.
The watch bears a Cyrillic monogram and is engraved with a mitre, as worn by the metropolitan bishop of the Russian Orthodox Church.
The Bronnikov family originally worked in Vjatka in Russia and their speciality was the creation of all-wood and all-ivory watches. Ivan (circa 1770-1860), a skillful joiner and turner, was the first Bronnikov mentioned in the records. His son Semyon Ivanovitch (1800-1875) had seven sons and two of them - Mikhail Semyonovitch and Nicolai Semyonovitch - continued his work. Mikhail's son Nicolai Mikhailovitch was the last watchmaker in the family and left Vjatka in 1909 or 1910; it is assumed that he worked for the company of Paul Buhre in Moscow. Important museums such as the Hermitage, the Moscow Clock Industry Research Institute, the Tbilisi Museum of People's Art, the Physikalisch-Mathematischer Salon in Dresden as well as renowned private collections all over the world own timepieces created by members of the Bronnikov family.

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