A LATE LOUIS XVI ORMOLU BLACK AND WHITE MARBLE PORTICO MANTLE CLOCK

LATE 18TH CENTURY

Details

A LATE LOUIS XVI ORMOLU BLACK AND WHITE MARBLE PORTICO MANTLE CLOCK
Late 18th Century
The circular white-enamelled dial with Arabic chapters signed De Belle Paris, St Honore, with Arabic chapters and concentric rings for the date and day of the week with their corresponding deity, blued steel calendar hands and lyre-pierced and chased ormolu, hour and minute hands, the movement with countwheel strike on a bell and pin-wheel escapement with a later Apollo Sunburst pendulum, surmounted by an eagle seated on a globe, hung between spreading architectural supports with fluted pilasters and scrolling sides, mounted with flowers and up-turned foliage, surmounted by an Ionic capital and a lion finial, the rounded shaped rectangular base surmounted by Pallas Athene and by Prudence, the panelled plinth mounted with foliate borders, on engine turned bell shaped feet, possibly regilt, possibly made for the Spanish market
28 in. (71 cm.) high; 23 in. (58 in. (23 cm.) wide; 8 in. (21.5 cm.) deep

Lot Essay

Jean Franois de Belle, matre horloger in 1781, specialised in mechanical clocks and may have produced several clocks for the Spanish market. One is in the collection of the Palacio Real in Madrid. Tardy, Dictionnaire des Horlogers Franais, Paris, 1971 (5th ed.), p. 41.
A closely related example was sold anonymously at Christie's New York, 8 May 1991, lot 43.

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