Lot 92

Paris, Movement No. 1712 / 1956, 92 x 57 x 32 mm, 295 g, circa 1820
A fine musical box with two exquisite sounding tunes, relief picture and concealed erotic automaton
Case: tortoiseshell, engraved, pink gold thumb piece. Movm.: brass, pinned cylinder, sectional comb with 15 sections of teeth grouped in fours and one with five (65 teeth in total), two-arm centrifugal brake.
The lid of the box is hinged and opens with a gold thumbpiece; the top is exquisitely engraved with a relief showing the Porte Saint-Denis in Paris. Inside, a transparent cover reveals the musical movement. The front of the box is fitted with two delicate mother-of-pearl discs to change the tune and release the musical movement. The floor has an aperture for the winding square and a pusher to open the hinged cover that reveals the four-colour gold automaton scene: The erotic motif shows a couple making love in a meadow in a park setting and comes to life as soon as the mother-of-pearl disc is moved and the music plays. A man watches the scene from the background.
The Porte Saint-Denis is a triumphal arch Paris and was inspired by the Arch of Titus in Rome. It was built by François Blondel in 1672 in honour of King Louis XIV and is one of the most important monuments of representational art at the time.