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Lot Essay
Lyric poetry and Love's triumph is celebrated by addorsed kneeling figures of Atlas metamorphosing into Roman foliage at an altar pedestal, which is supported on a laurel-wreathed plinth and displays a beribboned trophy of Cupid's weapons.
The signature 'Lepaute Horloger Du Roi' refers to an important family of clock-makers active from the mid-18th into the 19th Century. The workshop was founded in 1750 by the brothers Jean-André (maître horloger in 1759) and Jean-Baptiste Lepaute (maître horloger in 1776) with the title Horloger du Roi being acquired before October 1751. Subsequently their nephews Pierre-Basile and Pierre Henry, and the following generation followed in the business, continuing the family tradition well into the 19th Century. The signature 'Lepaute Horologer Du Roi' itself was used until 1792. It is impossible to distinguish, with any precision, the individual contribution of each of the associates in the work produced (J,-A. Augarde, Les Ouvriers du Temps, Geneva, 1996, pp. 351-353).
The same model but on an additional plinth, surmounted by a flower basket and with a movement by Cousin is illustrated in P. Kjellberg, Encyclopédie de la pendule Française du Moyen Age au XXe siècle, Paris, 1997, p.179, fig. A. A clock of this model with an unsigned movement was sold at Sotheby's Monaco, 26-27 May 1980, lot 729.
The signature 'Lepaute Horloger Du Roi' refers to an important family of clock-makers active from the mid-18th into the 19th Century. The workshop was founded in 1750 by the brothers Jean-André (maître horloger in 1759) and Jean-Baptiste Lepaute (maître horloger in 1776) with the title Horloger du Roi being acquired before October 1751. Subsequently their nephews Pierre-Basile and Pierre Henry, and the following generation followed in the business, continuing the family tradition well into the 19th Century. The signature 'Lepaute Horologer Du Roi' itself was used until 1792. It is impossible to distinguish, with any precision, the individual contribution of each of the associates in the work produced (J,-A. Augarde, Les Ouvriers du Temps, Geneva, 1996, pp. 351-353).
The same model but on an additional plinth, surmounted by a flower basket and with a movement by Cousin is illustrated in P. Kjellberg, Encyclopédie de la pendule Française du Moyen Age au XXe siècle, Paris, 1997, p.179, fig. A. A clock of this model with an unsigned movement was sold at Sotheby's Monaco, 26-27 May 1980, lot 729.