Allegories of the Continents

Four figural groups at the top, on the side parts and bottom of the clock are allegories of four continents or four parts of the world. Unlike the very competent formation of the actual casing, the figures reveal the hand of a craftsman of limited skills, a woodcarver who clearly found the making animals and human figures a major challenge. In the presentation of the allegories of the continents the master kept to the conventions to a minimum, partially because of his ignorance of the iconographical standards and partially because of want of the skills needed for the making of more complex compositions. This work can be ascribed with a great deal of security to the clock-maker Leopold Körner, born 1726, who from 1779 to 1797 was city master, head in 1796, and died in 1807. His table clock made in about 1780 is preserved in Prague, and at a Sotheby’s auction of March 22, 1971 (n 112) there was a clock à l’Anglaise dated about 1750.