A QUEEN ANNE STRIKING TABLE CLOCK

Sir Nicholas Goodison noted: Thomas Tompion's partnership with his nephew Edward Banger lasted from about 1700⁄1-1707/8. The case and mounts of this clock are closely similar to Tompion & Banger No. 418 (see R.W. Symonds, 1951, op. cit., p. 154, fig. 131). It has many of the typical features of Tompion's finest work, but was fitted with Dutch striking (the half-hour striking the coming hour count on the smaller bell, not the last) and had lost its repeat work. The analysis of the various holes drilled in the plates and the scratched Dutch cleaning marks, words on the fusees ('stag', 'gaamewerke… grande'), etc. led Dan Parkes, who restored the striking and repeat work in 1985, to conclude that in its early days the clock was exported to Holland and was then converted to Dutch striking, or possibly adapted in Tompion's workshop with Dutch striking for export. It was decided to re-convert the striking mechanism to its original state of English striking and to restore the missing repeat work.

THOMAS TOMPION AND EDWARD BANGER
Thomas Tompion (1639-1713) stands as England's most celebrated clockmaker. Despite his extraordinary career, little is known of his beginnings. It is not known to whom he was apprenticed, but by September 1671 he was in London and three years later made Free of the Clockmakers Company by Redemption. The same year, he established his shop at the sign of the ‘Dial and Three Crowns’ in Water Lane and met the great experimental physicist Robert Hooke, whose contacts would raise Tompion from obscurity to the attention of royalty. Patronised by Charles II and subsequently William III, Tompion received the most significant commissions of the day, including two clocks for the Greenwich Observatory and a year-going table clock to celebrate the 1689 coronation of William and Mary, now known as the ‘Mostyn Tompion' and at the British Museum (Museum number 1982,0702.1). He became Master of the Clockmakers Company in 1703 and his fame was such that his portrait was painted by the Court artist, Sir Godfrey Kneller. Upon his death, Tompion was buried in Westminster Abbey.

With succession in mind Tompion took Edward Banger, the husband of his niece Margaret Kent, into partnership in 1700 or 1701. This lasted until 1707 or 1708 when something went wrong with the relationship and Banger is presumed to have left to go into business on his own. There has been much speculation as to what may have caused the rift but all that is known for certain is that Banger carried on making clocks before dying intestate in 1719 (Evans, 2006, op. cit., pp. 55-58), it has also been suggested that Banger could have become a leather seller (G. Boney, 'Was Banger Really Fired?', Antiquarian Horology, June 2003, pp. 392-405.)

THE CASE AND FINE ENGRAVING
Jeremy Evans classifies Tompion’s cases in three distinct styles for ‘spring’ clocks (Evans, Carter, Wright, 2013, op. cit., pp. 154-5): Phase 1 circa 1680-90; Phase 2 circa 1690-1711 and; Phase 3 circa 1697-1713. Evans records the present table clock as one of just eleven known 'phase 3' 8-day ebony table clocks (Evans, op. cit., 2006, pp. 78-80).
Tompion's engraving can for the most part be identified with four principal craftsmen from his workshop. The 'tulip' engraver is the earliest and the other three are identified by the clock on which their work first appears: 'G.155', 'G.195' and 'G.515' (the 'G' referring to 'Graver'). The present clock has engraving in the hand of 'G. 195' who has possibly been identified as Henry Adeane (Evans, Carter, Wright, 2013, op. cit., pp. 181-3.) employed by Tompion from circa 1693-4. His work on the dial plate of a longcase clock (No. 318) features the engraved name ‘Henry’ beneath the chapter ring. Adeane was made free of the Clockmakers Company in 1675. His work is typified by the use of decorative masks and gargoyles within the foliate scrolls and particularly down the centre line of the backplate, the present clock also features a mask on the right hand movement bracket.

DAN PARKES
The conservator and restorer Dan Parkes was a founder member of the Antiquarian Horological Society and co-author of the seminal work ‘Early English Clocks’ (with P.G. Dawson and C.B. Drover, Woodbridge, 1982). In 1985 Sir Nicholas Goodison commissioned him to reinstate and restore the pull quarter repeat mechanism of this clock. Parkes learnt his trade studying from his grandfather in the 1930s, which included early encounters with both the celebrated ‘Sussex’ and ‘Tulip’ Tompions, at the family firm A.& H. Rowley, Parkes & Co. in Clerkenwell.