90th Auction

2014/11/15

Lot 67

A. Lange & Söhne Glashütte B/Dresden, Movement No. 34707, Case No. 34707, 49 mm, 108 g, circa 1898
A very fine, extremely rare Glashuette quarter repeating hunting case pocket watch with case decoration by Prof. Carl Ludwig Graff - manufactured in quality 1A - sold in 1898 for the sum of 1228 Marks, formerly with rating certificate of the observatory Leipzig
Case: 18k pink gold, lavishly engraved with Renaissance motives, according to a layout by Prof. Graff, the back lid with an oval polychrome enamel plaque in the centre with the depiction of Minerva, the goddess of crafts, poetry and wisdom, à goutte, gold dome, slide for repeating mechanism, glazed movement. Dial: enamel, Arabic hours, auxiliary seconds, red outer five-minute divisions, gold Louis XV hands. Movm.: 3/4 plate movement, nickel-plated, "fausses côtes" decoration, 2 hammers / 2 gongs, screwed gold chatons, gold screw compensation balance, hand-engraved balance cock, index spring fine adjusting device, gold lever and escape wheel, chatoned diamond endstone on balance.
Lit.: "Die Lange-Liste" by Martin Huber, Munich 2000, page 168.
Prof. Karl Ludwig Theodor Graff
Prof. Karl Ludwig Theodor Graff, who was appointed director of the Institute of Applied Arts in Dresden (Dresdner Kunstgewerbeschule) in 1875, to create designs in this vein. From the 1880s onwards, more and more ostentatious decorations were created at Lange & Soehne company, where the medallion showed the image of the ancient Roman goddess Minerva, who had been worshipped as goddess of crafts, poetry and wisdom. Professor Graff then copyrighted his design which had won first prize in the Institute of Applied Arts' 1890 competition for the design and decoration of pocket watch cases.

Sold

estimated
50.00065.000 €
Price realized
80.600 €