HOROLOGY.

Fig. 105.—Cup of Lapis-lazuli, mounted in Gold enriched with Rubies, and a Figure in Gold enamelled. (Italian Work of the 16th Century.)Fig. 106.—Vase of Rock-crystal, mounted in Silver-gilt and enamelled. (Italian Work of the 16th Century.)

Fig. 105.—Cup of Lapis-lazuli, mounted in Gold enriched with Rubies, and a Figure in Gold enamelled. (Italian Work of the 16th Century.)

Fig. 106.—Vase of Rock-crystal, mounted in Silver-gilt and enamelled. (Italian Work of the 16th Century.)

That rare piece was the work of Jean Regnard, a Parisian goldsmith; and the period when such works were produced was precisely that during which religious wars were about to cause the annihilation of a great number of thechefs-d’œuvre, ancient and modern, of the goldsmith’s art. The new iconoclasts, the Huguenots, shattered and melted down, wherever they triumphed, the sacred vessels, the shrines, the reliquaries. Then were lost the most precious gold-wrought memorials of the times of St. Eloi, of Charlemagne, of Suger, and of St. Louis.

At the same period Germany, where the influence of the Italian school had made itself felt less directly, but which could not escape from its impulse, possessed also, especially at Nuremburg and Augsburg, goldsmiths’ workshops of high character; these furnished the empire, and even foreign countries, with remarkable works. A new career opened to the German goldsmiths when the cabinet-makers of their country had invented thosecabinets, whereof we have already said something (videFurniture), and in the intricate decoration of which appear statuettes, silver bas-reliefs, and inlay-work of gold and precious stones.

Thetreasuriesand the museums of Germany have succeeded in preserving many rich objects of that period; but one of the most rare collections of the kind is that in Berlin, where, in substitution for the originals in silver which have been melted down, are gathered a great number of beautiful bas-reliefs in lead, and several vases in tin,—copies of pieces of plate supposed to be of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. And on this point it may be remarked that the high price of the material, together with the sumptuary laws, not always admitting of the possession of gold or silver vases by the citizens, it sometimes happened that the goldsmiths manufactured a table-service of tin, on which they bestowed so much pains that these articles were transferred from the sideboards of citizens to those of princes. The inventory of the Count d’Angoulême, father of Francis I., alludes to a considerable table-service of tin. Indeed, several goldsmiths devoted themselves exclusively to this description of work; and, to this day, the tins of François Briot, who flourished in the time of Henry II., are regarded as the most perfect specimens of plate of the sixteenth century.

However that may be, after Cellini, and until the reign of Louis XIV., the goldsmith’s art did but follow faithfully in the footsteps of the Italian master. Elevated by the impulse of the Renaissance, the art succeeded in maintaining itself in that high position without, however, any striking individuality discovering itself, until, in a century not less illustrious than the sixteenth, new masters appeared and imparted to it additional lustre and magnificence. These are named Ballin, Delaunay, Julien Defontaine, Labarre, Vincent Petit, Roussel, goldsmiths and jewellers of Louis XIV., who retained them in his pay, and lodged them in the Louvre. It was for that prince they produced an imposing collection of admirable works, for which Le Brun often furnished the designs, andunder an inspiration altogether French, abandoned the graceful, though ratherfluetteforms of the Renaissance, and gave to them a character more diffuse and grand. Then, for a short time, every article of royal furniture proceeded from the hands of the goldsmith. But, alas! once more the majority of these marvels must disappear, as happened to so many others. Even the monarch who had ordered them despatched his acquisitions to the crucibles of the mint, when, the war having exhausted the public treasury, he found himself compelled, at least for example’s sake, to sacrifice his silver plate and to deck his table with earthenware.

Having finished this sketch of the goldsmith’s art in general, it may not be inappropriate to add a brief notice of the more special history of the French goldsmiths, of which the wealthy corporation may be considered not only as the most ancient, but as the model of all those that were formed among us in the Middle Ages. But first, since we have already referred to the exceptional part taken by the goldsmiths of Limoges in the industrial movement of that period, we cannot proceed further without noting another description of works, which, although derived from the oldest examples, nevertheless gave, and with justice, a kind of new lustre to the ancient city where the first goldsmiths of France had distinguished themselves.

“Towards the end of the fourteenth century,” says M. Labarte, “the taste for gold and silver articles having led to the disuse of plate of enamelled copper, the Limousine enamellers endeavoured to discover a new mode of applying enamel to the reproduction of graphic subjects. Their researches led them to dispense with the chaser for delineating the outlines of designs; the metal was entirely concealed under the enamel, which, spread by the brush, formed altogether both the drawing and the colouring. The first attempts at this novel painting on copper were necessarily very imperfect; but the processes gradually improved, until at length, in 1540, they attained perfection. Prior to that period, the enamels of Limoges were almost exclusively devoted to the reproduction of sacred subjects, of which the German school furnished the designs. But the arrival of Italian artists at the court of Francis I., and the publication of engravings of the works of Raphael and other great masters of Italy, gave a new direction to the school of Limoges, which adopted the style of that of Italy. Il Rosso and Primaticcio painted cartoons for the Limousine enamellers; and then

DRAGEOIR, OR TABLE ORNAMENTOf Enamelled and Gilt Copper. German, latter part of Sixteenth Century.

DRAGEOIR, OR TABLE ORNAMENT

Of Enamelled and Gilt Copper. German, latter part of Sixteenth Century.

they who had previously worked only on plates intended to be set in diptychs, on caskets, created a new species of goldsmith’s art. Basins, ewers, cups, salt-cellars, vases, and utensils of all sorts, manufactured with thin sheet-copper in the most elegant forms were decorated with their rich and brilliant paintings.”

In the highest rank of artists who have rendered this attractive work illustrious we must place Léonard (Limousin), painter to Francis I., who was the first director of the royal manufacture of enamels founded by that king at Limoges. Then followed Pierre Raymond (Figs. 107 to 110), whose works date from 1534 to 1578, the Penicauds, Courteys, Martial Raymond, Mercier, and Jean Limousin, enameller to Anne of Austria.

Figs. 107 and 108.—Faces of an Hexagonal Enamelled Salt-cellar, representing the Labours of Hercules. Executed at Limoges, for Francis I., by Pierre Raymond.

With the remark that, at the end of the sixteenth century, Venice, doubtless imitating Limoges, also manufactured pieces of plate in enamelled copper, we return to our national goldsmiths.

This celebrated corporation could, without much trouble, be traced back in Gaul to the epoch of the Roman occupation; but it is unnecessary to search for its origin beyond St. Eloi, who is still its patron, after having been its founder and protector. Eloi, become prime-minister to Dagobert I.—thanks in some measure to his merits as a goldsmith, which distinguished him above all, and gained him the honour of royal friendship—continued to work no less at his forge as a simple artisan. “He made for the king,” says the chronicle, “a great number of gold vases enriched with precious stones, and he worked incessantly, seated with his servant Thillon, a Saxon by birth, at his side, who followed the lessons of his master.”

Fig. 109.—Interior base of a Salt-cellar, executed at Limoges; with a Portrait of Francis I.

This extract seems to indicate that already the goldsmith’s art was organised as a corporation, and that it comprised three ranks of artisans—the masters, the journeymen, and the apprentices. Besides, it is clear that St. Eloi founded two distinct corporations of goldsmiths—one for secular, the other for religious works, in order that the objects sacred to worship should not be manufactured by the same hands that executed those designed for profane uses or worldly state. The seat of the former in Paris was first the Cité, near the very abode of St. Eloi long known as themaison au fèvre, and surrounding the monastery of St. Martial. Within the jurisdiction of that monastery was the space comprised between the streets of La Barillerie, of La Calandre, Aux Fèves, and of La Vieille Draperie, under the denomination of “St. Eloi’s Enclosure.” A raging fire destroyed the entire quarter inhabited by the goldsmiths, excepting the monastery; and the lay goldsmiths went forth and established themselves as a colony, still under the auspices of their patron saint, in the shadow of the Church of St. Paul des Champs, which he had caused to be constructed on the right bank of the Seine. The assemblage of forges and shops of these artisans soon formed a sort of suburb, which was calledClôture, orCulture St. Eloi. Subsequently some of the goldsmiths returned to the Cité; but they remained on the Grand-Pont, and returned no more to the streets, where the cobblers had established themselves. Moreover, the monastery of St. Martial had become, under the administration of its first abbess, St. Anne, a branch of the goldsmith’s school which the “Seigneur Eloi” had established in 631 in the Abbey of Solignac, in the environs of Limoges. That abbey, whose first abbot, Thillon or Théau—a pupil, or, as the chronicle expresses it, a servant of St. Eloi—was also a skilful goldsmith, preserved during several centuries the traditions of its founder, and furnished not only models, but also skilful workmen, to all the monastic ateliers of Christendom which exclusively manufactured for the churches jewelled and enamelled plate.

Fig. 110.—Ewer in Enamel, of Limoges, by Pierre Raymond.

However, the goldsmiths of Paris engaged in secular works continued to maintain themselves as a corporation; and their privileges, which they ascribed to the special regard of Dagobert for St. Eloi, were recognised, it is said, in 768 by a royal charter, and confirmed in 846 in a capitulary of Charles the Bald. These goldsmiths worked in gold and silver only for kings and nobles, whom the strictness of the sumptuary laws did not reach.The Dictionary of Jean de Garlande informs us that, in the eleventh century, there were in Paris four classes of workmen in the goldsmith’s trade—those who coined money (nummularii), the clasp-makers (firmacularii), the manufacturers of drinking-goblets (cipharii), and the goldsmiths, properly so called (aurifabri). The ateliers and the shop-windows of these last were on the Pont-au-Change (Fig. 111), in competition with the money-changers, who for the most part were Lombards or Italians. From that epoch a rivalry commenced between these two trade guilds, which only ceased on the complete downfall of the money-changers.

Fig. 111.—Interior of the Atelier of Etienne Delaulne, a celebrated goldsmith of Paris, in the Sixteenth Century. Designed and engraved by himself.

When Etienne Boileau, Provost of Paris in the reign of Louis IX., wrote in obedience to the legislative designs of the king, his famous “Livre des Métiers,” to establish the existence of guilds on permanent foundations, he had scarcely more to do than to transcribe the statutes of the goldsmiths almost the same as those instituted by St. Eloi, with the modifications consequent on the new order of things. By the terms of the ordinances drawn up by Louis, the goldsmiths of Paris were exempt from the watch, and from all other feudal services; they elected, every three years, two or threeanciens(seniors) “for the protection of the trade,” and theseanciensexercised permanent vigilance over the works of their colleagues, and over the quality of the gold and silver material used by them. An apprentice was not admitted as a master until after ten years’ apprenticeship; and no master could have more than one apprentice, in addition to those belonging to his own family. The corporation, so far as concerned the fraternity with respect to works for charitable and devotional purposes, had a seal (Fig. 116) which placed it under the patronage of St. Eloi; but, with regard to its industrial association, it imprinted on manufactured articles aseing, or stamp, which guaranteed the value of the metal. The corporation soon obtained, from Philip of Valois, a coat-of-arms, which conferred on it a sort of professional nobility; and acquired, owing to the distinguished protection extended to it by that king, a position which nevertheless it did not succeed in preserving in the united constitution of the six mercantile bodies; for, although it laid claim to the first rank on account of its antiquity, it was forced, notwithstanding the undeniable superiority of its works, to be contented with the second, and even to descend to the third rank.

Fig. 112.—Stamp of Lyons.Fig. 113.—Stamp of Chartres.Fig. 114.—Stamp of Melun.Fig. 115.—Stamp of Orléans.Fig. 116.—Ancient Corporate Seal of the Goldsmiths of Paris.

Fig. 112.—Stamp of Lyons.

Fig. 113.—Stamp of Chartres.

Fig. 114.—Stamp of Melun.

Fig. 115.—Stamp of Orléans.

Fig. 116.—Ancient Corporate Seal of the Goldsmiths of Paris.

The goldsmiths, at the time of the compilation of the code of professions by Etienne Boileau, were already separated, voluntarily or otherwise, from several trades which had long appeared in their train; thecristalliers, or lapidaries; the gold and silver beaters; the embroiderers inorfroi(gold-fringe); thepatenôtriers(bead-stringers) in precious stones lived under their own regulations; themonétaires(bullion-dealers) remained under the control of the king and his mint; thehanapiers(drinking-cup makers), thefermailleurs(makers of clasps), the pewterers, boxmakers, inferior artisans and others who worked in common metals, had no longer any connection with the goldsmiths of Paris. But in the provinces, in towns where the masters of a trade were insufficient to constitute a community or fraternity having its chiefs and its own administration, it was indispensable to reunite under the same banner the trades between which there was the most agreement, or rather the least contrariety. Thus, in certain localities in France and the Low Countries, the goldsmiths, proud as they might be of the nobility of their origin, sometimes found themselves united as equals with the

Fig. 117.—Arms of the Corporation of Goldsmiths of Paris, with this device: “Vases Sacrés et Couronnes, voilà notre Œuvre.”

pewterers, the mercers, the braziers, and even the grocers; and thus it came to pass that they combined on their banners of fleurs-de-lis the proper arms of each of these several trades. Thus, for instance, we see the banner of the goldsmiths of Castellane (Fig. 118) united with the retail mercers and tailors—it shows a pair of scissors, scales, and an ell measure; at Chauny (Fig. 119), a ladder, a hammer, and a vase, indicate that the goldsmiths had for compeers the pewterers and the slaters; at Guise (Fig. 120), the association of farriers, coppersmiths, and locksmiths, is allied with the goldsmiths by a horse-shoe, a mallet, and a key; the brewers of Harfleur(Fig. 121) quartered in their arms four barrels between the bars of the crossgulescharged with a goblet of gold, which was the emblem of their associates the goldsmiths; at Maringues (Fig. 122), the gold cup on a fieldgulessurmounts the grocer’s candles.

These banners were displayed only on great public ceremonies, in solemn processions, receptions, marriages, the obsequies of kings, queens, princes, and princesses. Exempted from military service, the goldsmiths, unlike other trade corporations, had not the opportunity of distinguishing themselves in the militia of the communes. They, nevertheless, occupied the first place in the state processions of trades, and frequently filled posts of honour. Thus in Paris they had the custody of the gold and silver plate when the good city entertained some illustrious guest at a banquet; they carried the canopy above the head of the king on his joyful accession; or, crowned with roses, walked bearing on their shoulders the venerated shrine of St. Geneviève (Fig. 123).

Fig. 118. Fig. 119. Fig. 120.

Fig. 121. Fig. 122.

In the wealthy cities of Belgium, where the corporations were queens (reines), the goldsmiths, by virtue of their privileges, dictated the law and swayed the people. No doubt in France they were far from enjoying the same political influence; nevertheless, one of them was that provost of merchants, Etienne Marcel, who, from 1356 to 1358, played so bold a partduring the regency of the Dauphin Charles. But it was especially in periods of peace and prosperity that the goldsmith’s art in Paris shone in all its splendour; then its banners incessantly waved in the breeze for the festivals and processions of its numerous and wealthy brotherhoods to the churches of Notre-Dame, St. Martial, St. Paul, and St. Denis of Montmartre.

Fig. 123.—The Corporation of the Goldsmiths of Paris carrying the Shrine of St. Geneviève. (From an engraving of the Seventeenth Century.)

In 1337 the number of the wardens of the goldsmith’s guild in Paris had increased from three to six. They had their names engraved and their marks stamped on tablets of copper, which were preserved as archives in the town-hall. Every French goldsmith, admitted a master after the production of his principal work, left the impression of his sign manual, or private mark, on similar tablets of copper deposited in the office of the guild; while the stamp of the community itself was required to be engraved at the mint to authorise its being used. Every corporation thus had its mark,which the wardens set on the articles after having assayed and weighed the metal. These marks, at least in the later centuries, represented in general the special arms or emblems of the cities; for Lyons, it is a lion; for Melun, an eel; for Chartres, a partridge; for Orleans, the head of Joan of Arc, &c. (Figs. 112 to 115).

Fig. 124.—Gold Cross, chased. (A French Work of the Seventeenth Century.)

The goldsmiths of France manifested, and with reason, a jealousy of their privileges, it being more indispensable for them than for any other artisans to inspire that confidence without which the trade would have been lost; for their works were required to bear as authentic and legal a value as that of money. Therefore, it may be understood that they exercised keen vigilance over all gold or silver objects which were in any way under their warranty: hence the frequent visits of the sworn masters to the ateliers and shops of the goldsmiths; hence the perpetual lawsuits against all instances of negligence or fraud; hence those quarrels with other trades which arrogated to themselves the right of working in precious metals without having qualified for it. Confiscation of goods, the whip, the pillory, were penalties inflicted on goldsmiths in contraband trade who altered the standard, concealed copper beneath the gold, or substituted false for precious stones.

It, indeed, seems remarkable that while for the most part other trades were subject to the control of the goldsmiths, the latter were responsible only to themselves for the aggressions which they constantly committed withinthe domain of rival industries. Whenever the object to be manufactured was of gold, it belonged to the goldsmith’s trade. The goldsmith made, by turns, spurs as the spur-maker; armour and arms, as the armourer; girdles and clasps, as the belt-maker and the clasp-maker. However, there is reason to believe that in the fabrication of these various objects, the goldsmith had recourse to the assistance of special artisans, who could scarcely fail to derive all possible advantage from such fortuitous association. Thus, when the gold-wrought sword which Dunois carried when Charles VII. entered Lyons in 1449, mounted in diamonds and rubies, and valued at more than fifteen thousand crowns, was to be made, the work of the goldsmiths probably consisted only of the fashioning and chasing the hilt, while the sword-cutler had to forge and temper the blade. In the same manner, when it was required to work a jewelled robe, such as Marie de Medicis wore at the baptism of her son in 1606, the robe being covered with thirty-two thousand precious stones and three thousand diamonds, the goldsmith had only to mount the stones and furnish the design for fixing them on the gold or silk tissue.

Fig. 125.—Pendant, adorned with Diamonds and Precious Stones. (Seventeenth Century.)

Long before Benvenuto and other skilful Italian goldsmiths were summoned by Francis I. to his court, the French goldsmiths had proved that they needed only a little encouragement to range themselves on a level with foreign artists. But that patronage having failed them, they left the country and established themselves elsewhere; thus at the court of Flanders,Antoine of Bordeaux, Margerie of Avignon, and Jean of Rouen, distinguished themselves. It is true that in the reign of Louis XII., whose exchequer had been exhausted in the Italian expeditions, gold and silver had become so scarce in France, that the king was obliged to prohibit the manufacture of all sorts of large plate (grosserie). But the discovery of America having brought with it an abundance of the precious metals, Louis XII. recalled his ordinance in 1510; and thenceforth the corporations of goldsmiths were seen to increase and prosper, as luxuriousness, diffused by the example of the great, descended to the lower ranks of society. Silver plate soon displaced that of tin; and before long personal display had attained such a height, “that the wife of a merchant wore on her person more jewels than were seen on the image of the Virgin.” The number of the goldsmiths then became so great that in the city of Rouen alone there were in 1563two hundred and sixty-fivemasters having the right of stamp!

Figs. 126 to 131.—Chains.

Figs. 132 to 136.—Rings.

To sum up this chapter. Until the middle of the fourteenth century it is the religious art which prevails; the goldsmiths are engaged only in executing shrines, reliquaries, and church ornaments. At the end of that century, and during the one following, they manufactured gold and silver

Figs. 137 to 141.—Seals.

plate, enriching with their works the treasuries of kings and nobles, and imparting brilliant display to the adornment of dress. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries the goldsmiths applied themselves more to chasing, enamelling, and inlay-work. Everywhere are to be seen marvellous trinkets—necklaces, rings, buckles, chains, seals (Figs. 124 to 142). The weight of metal is no longer the principal merit; the skill of the workman is especially appreciated, and the goldsmith executes in gold, in silver, and in precious stones, the beautiful productions of painters and engravers. Nevertheless, the demand for delicate objects had the disadvantage of requiring much solder and alloy, which deteriorated the standard of metal. Then a desperate struggle commenced between the goldsmiths and the mint—a struggle which was prosecuted through a maze of legal proceedings, petitions, and ordinances, until the middle of the reign of Louis XV. At the same time the Italian and German goldsmiths making an irruption into France and introducing materials of a low standard, the old professional integrity became suspected and was soon disregarded. At the end of the sixteenth century very little plate was ornamented: there is a return to massive plate, the weight and standard of which could be easily verified. Gold is scarcely any longer employed, except for jewels; and silver in a thousand forms creeps into the manufacture of furniture. Aftercabinets, covered and ornamented with carving in silver, came the articles of silver furniture invented by Claude Ballin. But the mass of precious metal withdrawn from circulation was soon returned to it, and the fashion passed away. The goldsmiths found themselves reduced to manufacture only objects of small size; and for the most part they limited themselves to works of jewellery, which subjected them to less annoyance from the mint. Besides, the art of the lapidary had almost changed its character, as well as the trade in precious stones. Pierre de Montarsy, jeweller to the king, effected a kindof revolution in his art, which the travels of Chardin, of Bernier, and of Tavernier, in the East had, so to say, enlarged. The cutting and mounting of precious stones has not since been excelled. It may be said that Montarsy was the first jeweller, as Ballin was the last goldsmith.

Fig. 142.—Chased and Enamelled Brooch, embellished with Pearls and Diamonds. (Seventeenth Century.)

Modes of measuring Time among the Ancients.—The Gnomon.—The Water-Clock.—The Hour-Glass.—The Water-Clock, improved by the Persians and by the Italians.—Gerbert invents the Escapement and the moving Weights.—The Striking-bell.—Maistre Jehan des Orloges.—Jacquemart of Dijon.—The first Clock in Paris.—Earliest portable Timepiece.—Invention of the spiral Spring.—First appearance of Watches.—The Watches, or “Eggs,” of Nuremberg.—Invention of the Fusee.—Corporation of Clockmakers.—Noted Clocks at Jena, Strasburg, Lyons, &c.—Charles-Quint and Jannellus.—The Pendulum.

AMONG the ancients there were three instruments for measuring time—thegnomon, or sun-dial, which is only, as we know, a table whereon lines are so arranged as successively to meet the shadow cast by a gnomon,[20]thus indicating the hour of the day according to the height or inclination of the sun; the water-clock (clepsydra), which had for its principle the measured percolation of a certain quantity of water; and the hour-glass, wherein the liquid is exchanged for sand. It would be difficult to determine which of these three chronometric modes can lay claim to priority. There is this to be said that, according to the Bible, in the eighth century before Christ, Ahaz, King of Judah, caused a sun-dial to be constructed at Jerusalem; again, Herodotus says Anaximander introduced the sun-dial into Greece, whence it passed on to the other parts of the then civilised world; and that, in the year 293 before our era, the celebrated Papirius Cursor, to the astonishment of his fellow-citizens, had a sun-dial traced near the temple of Jupiter Quirinus.

According to the description given by Athena (Athenæus?), the water-clock was formed of an earthenware or metal vessel filled with water, and then suspended over a reservoir whereon lines were marked indicatingthe hours, as the water which escaped drop by drop from the upper vessel came to the level. We find this instrument employed by most ancient nations, and in many countries it remained in use until the tenth century of the Christian era.

Fig. 143.—The Clockmaker. Designed and Engraved by J. Amman.

In one of his dialogues Plato declares that the philosophers are far more fortunate than the orators—“these being the slaves of a miserable water-clock; whereas the others are at liberty to make their discourse as long as they please.” To explain this passage, we must remember that it was the practice in the Athenian courts of justice, as subsequently in those of Rome, to measure the time allowed to the advocates for pleading by means of a water-clock. Three equal portions of water were put into it—one for the prosecutor, one for the defendant, and the third for the judge. A man was charged with the special duty of giving timely notice to each of the three speakers that his portion was nearly run out. If, on some unusual occasion, the time for one or other of the parties was doubled, it was called “adding water-clock to water-clock;” and when witnesses were giving evidence, or the text of some law was being read out, the percolation of the water was stopped: this was calledaquam sustinere(to retain the water).

The hour-glass, which is still in use to a considerable extent for measuring short intervals of time, had great analogy with the water-clock, but was never susceptible of such regularity. In fact, at different periods important improvements were applied to the water-clock. Vitruvius tells us that, about one hundred years before our era, Ctesibius, a mechanician of Alexandria, added several cogged-wheels to the water-clock, one of which moved a hand, showing the hour on a dial. This must have been, so far as historical documents admit of proof, the first step towards purely mechanical horology.

In order, then, to find an authentic date in the history of horology, we must go to the eighth century, when water-clocks, still further improved, were either made or imported into France; among others, one which Pope Paul I. sent to Pepin le Bref. We must, however, believe that these instruments can have attracted but little attention, or that they were speedily forgotten; for, one hundred years later, there appeared a water-clock at the court of Charlemagne, a present from the famous caliph Aroun-al-Raschid, regarded, indeed almost celebrated, as a notable event. Of this Eginhard has left us an elaborate description. It was, he says, in brass, damaskeened with gold, and marked the hours on a dial. At the end of each hour an equal number of small iron balls fell on a bell, and made it sound as many times as the hour indicated by the needle. Twelve windows immediately opened, out of which were seen to proceed the same number of horsemen armedcap-à-pie, who, after performing divers evolutions, withdrew into the interior of the mechanism, and then the windows closed.

Shortly afterwards Pacificus, Archbishop of Verona, constructed one far superior to all that had preceded it; for, besides giving the hours, it indicated the date of the month, the days of the week, the phases of the moon, &c. But still it was only an improved water-clock. Before horology could really assume an historical date, it was necessary that for motive power weights should be substituted for water, and that the escapement should be invented; yet it was only in the beginning of the tenth century that these important discoveries were made.

“In the reign of Hugh Capet,” says M. Dubois, “there lived in France a man of great talent and reputation named Gerbert. He was born in the mountains of Auvergne, and had passed his childhood in tending flocks near Aurillac. One day some monks of the order of St. Benedict met him in thefields: they conversed with him, and finding him precociously intelligent, took him into their convent of St. Gérauld. There Gerbert soon acquired a taste for monastic life. Eager for knowledge, and devoting all his spare moments to study, he became the most learned of the community. After he had taken vows, a desire to add to his scientific attainments led him to set out for Spain. During several years he assiduously frequented the universities of the Iberian peninsula. He soon found himself too learned for Spain; for, in spite of his truly sincere piety, ignorant fanatics accused him of sorcery. As that accusation might have involved him in deplorable consequences, he preferred not to await the result; and hastily quitting the town of Salamanca, which was his ordinary residence, he came to Paris, where he very soon made himself powerful friends and protectors. At length, after having successively been monk, superior of the convent of Bobbio, in Italy, Archbishop of Rheims, tutor to Robert I., King of France, and to Otho III., Emperor of Germany, who appointed him to the see of Ravenna, Gerbert rose to the pontifical throne under the name of Sylvester II.: he died in 1003. This great man did honour to his country and to his age. He was acquainted with nearly all the dead and living languages; he was a mechanician, astronomer, physician, geometrician, algebraist, &c. He introduced the Arab numerals into France. In the seclusion of his monastic cell, as in his archiepiscopal palace, his favourite relaxation was the study of mechanics. He was skilled in making sun-dials, water-clocks, hour-glasses, and hydraulic organs. It was he who first applied weight as a motive power to horology; and, in all probability, he is the inventor of that admirable mechanism called escapement—the most beautiful, as well as the most essential, of all the inventions which have been made in horology.”

This is not the place to give a description of these two mechanisms, which can hardly be explained except with the assistance of purely technical drawings, but it may be remarked that weights are still the sole motive power of large clocks, and the escapement alluded to has been alone employed throughout the world until the end of the seventeenth century. Notwithstanding the importance of these two inventions, little use was made of them during the eleventh, twelfth, and thirteenth centuries. The water-clock and hour-glass (Fig. 144) continued exclusively in use. Some were ornamented and engraved with much taste; and they contributed to thedecoration of apartments, as at present do our bronzes and clocks more or less costly.

Fig. 144.—An Hour-glass of the Sixteenth Century,—French Work.

History does not inform us who was the inventor of the striking machinery; but it is at least averred that it existed at the commencement of the twelfth century. The first mention of it is found in the “Usages de l’Ordre de Cîteaux,” compiled about 1120. It is there prescribed to the sacristan so to regulate the clock, that it “sounds and awakens him before matins;” in another chapter the monk is ordered to prolong the lecture until “the clock strikes.” At first, in the monasteries, the monks took it in turn to watch, and warn the community of the hours for prayer; and, in thetowns, there were night watchmen, who, moreover, were maintained in many places to announce in the streets the hour denoted by the clocks, the water-clocks, or the hour-glasses.

The machinery for striking once invented, we do not find that horology had attained to any perfection before the end of the thirteenth century; but, in the commencement of the following it received its impulse, and the art from that time continued to progress.

To give an idea of what was effected at that time, we will borrow a passage from the earliest writings in which horology is mentioned; that is, from an unpublished book by Philip de Maizières, entitled “Le Songe du Vieil Pélerin:”—“It is known that in Italy there is at present (about 1350) a man generally celebrated in philosophy, in medicine, and in astronomy; in his station, by common report, singular and grave, excelling in the above three sciences, and of the city of Padua. His surname is lost, and he is called ‘Maistre Jehan des Orloges,’ residing at present with the Comte de Vertus; and, for the treble sciences, he has for yearly wages and perquisites two thousand florins, or thereabouts. This Maistre Jean des Orloges has made an instrument, by some called asphereor clock, of the movement of the heavens, in which instrument are all the motions of the signs (zodiacal), and of the planets, with their circles and epicycles, and multiplied differences, wheels (roes) without number, with all their parts, and each planet in the said sphere, distinctly. On any given night, we see clearly in what sign and degree are the planets and the stars of the heavens; and this sphere is so cunningly made, that notwithstanding the multitude of wheels, which cannot well be numbered without taking the machinery to pieces, their entire mechanism is governed by one single counterpoise, so marvellous that the grave astronomers from distant regions come with great reverence to visit the said Maistre Jean and the work of his hands; and all the great clerks of astronomy, of philosophy, and of medicine, declare that there is no recollection of a man, either in written document or otherwise, who in this world has made so ingenious or so important an instrument of the heavenly movements as the said clock.... Maistre Jean made the said clock with his own hands, all of brass and of copper, without the assistance of any other person, and did nothing else during sixteen entire years, if the writer of the book, who had a great friendship for the said Maistre Jean, has been rightly informed.”

It is known, on the other hand, that the famous clockmaker, whose real name Maizières assumes to be lost, was called Jaques de Dondis; and that, in spite of the assertion of the writer, he had only to arrange the clock, the parts of which had been executed by an excellent workman named Antoine. However this may be, placed at the top of one of the towers of the palace of Padua, the clock of Jaques de Dondis, or of “Maistre Jean des Orloges,” excited general admiration, and several princes of Europe being desirous to have similar clocks, many workmen tried to imitate it. In fact, churches or monasteries were soon able to pride themselves on possessing similarchefs-d’œuvre.

Among the most remarkable clocks of that period, we must refer to that of which Froissart speaks, and which was carried away from the town of Courtray by Philip the Bold after the battle of Rosbecque in 1382. “The Duke of Burgundy,” says our author, “caused to be carried away from the market-place a clock that struck the hours, one of the finest which could be found on either side the sea; and he conveyed it piece by piece in carts, and the bell also. Which clock was brought and carted into the town of Dijon, in Burgundy, was there deposited and put up, and there strikes the twenty-four hours between day and night.”

It is the celebrated clock of Dijon which then as now was surmounted by two automata of iron, a man and a woman, striking the hours on the bell. The origin of the name ofJacquemartgiven to these figures has been much disputed. Ménage believes that the word is derived from the Latinjaccomarchiardus(coat of mail—attire of war); and he reminds us that, in the Middle Ages, it was the custom to station, on the summit of the towers, men (soldiers wearing thejacque) to give warning of the approach of the enemy, of fires, &c. Ménage adds that, when more efficient watchers occasioned the discontinuance of these nocturnal sentinels, it was probably considered desirable to preserve the remembrance of them by putting in the place they had occupied iron figures which struck the hours. Other writers trace the name even to the inventor of this description of clocks, who, according to them, lived in the fourteenth century, and was called Jacques Marck. Finally, Gabriel Peignot, who has written a dissertation on thejacquemartof Dijon, asserts that in 1422 a person named Jacquemart, clockmaker and locksmith, residing in the town of Lille, received twenty-two livres from the Duke of Burgundy, for repairingthe clock of Dijon; and from that he concludes, seeing how short the distance is from Lille to Courtray, whence the clock of Dijon had been taken, that this Jacquemart might well be the son or the grandson of the clockmaker who had constructed it about 1360; consequently the name of thejacquemartof Dijon is derived from that of its maker, old Jacquemart, the clockmaker of Lille (Fig. 145).

Fig. 145.—Jacquemart of Notre-Dame at Dijon, made at Courtray in the Fourteenth Century.

Giving to each of these opinions its due weight, we confine ourselves to stating that, from the end of the fourteenth century to the beginning ofthe fifteenth, numerous churches in Germany, Italy, and France already hadjacquemarts.

The first clock possessed by Paris was that in the turret of the Palais de Justice. Charles V. had it constructed in 1370 by a German artisan, Henri de Vic. It contained a weight for moving power, an oscillating piece for regulator, and an escapement. It was adorned with carvings by Germain Pilon, and was destroyed in the eighteenth century.

In 1389, the clockmaker Jean Jouvence made one for the Castle of Montargis. Those of Sens and of Auxerre, as well as that of Lund in Sweden, date from the same period. In the last, every hour two cavaliers met and gave each other as many blows as the hours to be struck: then a door opened, and the Virgin Mary appeared sitting on a throne, with the Infant Jesus in her arms, receiving the visit of the Magi followed by their retinue; the Magi prostrating themselves and tendering their presents. During the ceremony two trumpets sounded: then all vanished, to re-appear the following hour.

Back to Index Next