The 'Hippolytus' clock, celebrating 'ancient virtue' according to Grecian legend and Trojan history, recalls Seneca's 'Phaedra' and the lovely poetry of 'Phedre' (1677), Jean Baptiste Racine's much admired tragedy. The composition derives from the heroic canvas exhibited by Pierre Narcisse Guerin at the Paris 1802 Salon. The youthful Hippolytus, calumnated by his stepmother Phaedra, attempts to defend himself before his father Theseus, hero of Attica. The Klismos throne, buttressed by Apollo's sacred griffin, displays the 'oar and trident' trophy of Poseidon/Neptune, whom Thesus consulted.
The clock's bas relief tablet portrays the wave sent by the water deity to startle the horses of Hippolytus and cause his tragic death.
The4 fine modelling of the fiugures is typical of the work of the Parisian fondeur-doreur Claude Galle (d.1815), who is credited with the manufacture of other clocks of this model in the Palazzo Pitti, Florence and in a private collection in Munich, see Hans Ottomeyer's and Peter Pröschel's book Vergoldete Bronzen, vol.1, p.370, fig.5.13.15. The dial in the latter signed Griebel rue Vivienne. The present dial is signed L.J. Laguesse, who is recorded as working in Paris between 1810 and 1813.