Clock

A sculpturally conceived clock of bronze gilt, decorated with a seated figure of Juno, leaning on her right arm on the casing of the clock, holding a peacock in her left hand, placed on a prismatic wooden box lined with tortoiseshell that holds the music mechanism. The type of dial – convex, with large Roman numbers and number indicators for the minutes, as well as the more contemplative than royally posed and dignified figure of Juno, are characteristic of the age of Louis XVI. The exceptional quality of the bronze parts of the clock leads to the conclusion that its case was the work of a superlative Parisian bronzier. Author of the mechanism was Jean David Maillardet, famed builder of music and other mechanisms, born in 1748 in Fontaine. After he had worked in clock factory in Berlin, he worked in La Chaux-de-Fonds, and from about 1776 in his native town.