98th Auction
2018/11/10
Lot 291
Master's Mark "HS" (Hans Steinmeissel, Prague), Height 320 mm, dated 1553
An ornamental Prague Renaissance tabernacle clock with 24 hour dial and hour strike
Case: brass and copper, firegilt, chased ornaments, lion feet, pierced bell tower, 1 hammer / 1 bell. Dial: Front - applied chapter ring with Roman hours and applied hour knobs for time reading by night, later central dial with Arabic hours "13-24" and engraved compass rose. Small alarm disc with Roman numerals and hour knobs below. Back - hour strike control dial; blued iron hands. Movm.: iron frame, iron and brass train, gut/fusee for going train and chain/fusee for striking train, locking plate with outer teeth for strike mechanism, verge escapement, later front pendulum.
The lower movement plate on the left side is engraved with the year 1553, the initials of Hans Steinmeissel, a vase and the profile portrait of a gentleman. It is likely that the portrait shows the clockmaker himself.
The quadrangular, firegilt tombac case has a frustum-shaped base supported by four recumbent lions and decorated with repoussé ornamentation: foliage scrolls, pomegranates, and four faces. The faces sit in the centre of each of the four canted sides and represent the four continents that were known at the time - Europe, Asia, Africa and the Americas.
The visible sides are exquisitely engraved with flowers and tendrils, with serpents and a bird of paradise on the right and the heads of birds of prey on the left; on each side a vase with flowers sits in the centre. Both side panels can be removed and are flanked by two elaborately ornamented three-quarter columns with relief heads at the base and decorated with acanthus leaves, pomegranates, palmette and flower capitals.
The hemispherical, open-work belltower with pierced obelisk finial sits between four corner obelisks; the cast decoration shows floral tendrils, mythological beasts, griffins and mascaron faces.
Hans Steinmeissel was clockmaker in Prague from 1547 on. Steinmeisel married the daughter of clockmaker to the court Jakob Zech in 1548; in 1552 he refused to carry out the maintenance of Prague's astronomical clock on the grounds that "the clock would drive him crazy". Steinmeissel died in 1572 and left behind a widow and 5 children.
Two of his clocks are in museums in Stuttgart and Prague.
Quelle: "Meister der Uhrmacherkunst" by Juergen Abeler, 2nd edition, Wuppertal 2010, p. 541.
Provenance: Renowned private collection in Vienna
An ornamental Prague Renaissance tabernacle clock with 24 hour dial and hour strike
Case: brass and copper, firegilt, chased ornaments, lion feet, pierced bell tower, 1 hammer / 1 bell. Dial: Front - applied chapter ring with Roman hours and applied hour knobs for time reading by night, later central dial with Arabic hours "13-24" and engraved compass rose. Small alarm disc with Roman numerals and hour knobs below. Back - hour strike control dial; blued iron hands. Movm.: iron frame, iron and brass train, gut/fusee for going train and chain/fusee for striking train, locking plate with outer teeth for strike mechanism, verge escapement, later front pendulum.
The lower movement plate on the left side is engraved with the year 1553, the initials of Hans Steinmeissel, a vase and the profile portrait of a gentleman. It is likely that the portrait shows the clockmaker himself.
The quadrangular, firegilt tombac case has a frustum-shaped base supported by four recumbent lions and decorated with repoussé ornamentation: foliage scrolls, pomegranates, and four faces. The faces sit in the centre of each of the four canted sides and represent the four continents that were known at the time - Europe, Asia, Africa and the Americas.
The visible sides are exquisitely engraved with flowers and tendrils, with serpents and a bird of paradise on the right and the heads of birds of prey on the left; on each side a vase with flowers sits in the centre. Both side panels can be removed and are flanked by two elaborately ornamented three-quarter columns with relief heads at the base and decorated with acanthus leaves, pomegranates, palmette and flower capitals.
The hemispherical, open-work belltower with pierced obelisk finial sits between four corner obelisks; the cast decoration shows floral tendrils, mythological beasts, griffins and mascaron faces.
Hans Steinmeissel was clockmaker in Prague from 1547 on. Steinmeisel married the daughter of clockmaker to the court Jakob Zech in 1548; in 1552 he refused to carry out the maintenance of Prague's astronomical clock on the grounds that "the clock would drive him crazy". Steinmeissel died in 1572 and left behind a widow and 5 children.
Two of his clocks are in museums in Stuttgart and Prague.
Quelle: "Meister der Uhrmacherkunst" by Juergen Abeler, 2nd edition, Wuppertal 2010, p. 541.
Provenance: Renowned private collection in Vienna
Sold
estimated
20.000—30.000 €
Price realized
24.800 €