French quarter repeater made for the Islamic market Circa 1760

Gold, enamel, diamond and pearl-set verge watch by Julien Le Roy
–
A fine French 18 carat gold, enamel, diamond and pearl-set open faced quarter repeating verge pocket watch made for the Islamic market, circa 1760. Gilt-brass full-plate movement, cylindrical baluster pillars, fusee with chain, verge escapement, micrometric potence adjustment, plain three-arm brass balance, flat balance spring, pierced and engraved continental balance cock, polished steel endplate, silver regulation dial, repeating on a bell (lacking) activated by depressing the pendant. White enamel dial with Islamic numerals, outer dot minute divisions and Islamic five-minute numerals, original gold and seed pearl-set Islamic hands. Scalloped case, the band engraved and decorated with black champlevé enamel, the bezel with translucent green enamel and gold paillon flowers set with a rose-cut diamond on each lobe, seed pearl-set border, the back with a painted on enamel scene of a sea battle with an opalescent sunray sky, border to match the bezel. Dial and movement signed.
–
Diameter: 46.5 mm
–
Signed: Julien Le Roy à Paris
–
Julien Le Roy is one of the clockmakers who contributed most to the progress and the reputation of French watch- and clockmaking. Born in Tours on August 6, 1686, and died in 1759 in Paris. He came to Paris in 1699. In 1713 he achieved his master’s degree and in the following years, he became a jury member of the Paris Guild of Watchmakers. Later, Le Roy became director of the Société des Arts de Genève and, in 1739, Court Watchmaker (French Horloger Ordinaire du Roi) under Louis XV, he had his private quarters in the Louvre. He improved almost all branches of clockmaking and many important inventions in the realm of time measurement are owed to him. In 1717, Julien Le Roy presented an equation clock to the Royal Academy of Sciences which showed the true time, the place of the sun and its decline. His most important discoveries concerned watch mechanisms. The adjustable ‘potence’ for the verge escape wheel considerably improved the escapement’s functioning and the steel end-piece (coqueret) which allowed oil to be retained in the balance pivots in order to diminish frictional force, was quickly adopted by other watchmakers. He was the inventor of dumb repeating watches too, in 1740, he created a new arrangement that allowed the area allotted to the repeating work to be enlarged. This invention, called ‘à bâte levée’, was also adopted by his fellow clockmakers. In 1755 he invented a small anchor escapement used as a regulator for the repeating train. He contributed to the Encyclopédie by writing several articles on clockmaking together with his son Jean-Baptiste, the Academician. Le Roy ran his workshop in the Rue de Harlay in Paris until his death. Examples of his timepieces can be found in various important museums around the world, such as the Louvre and the Victoria and Albert Museum.