Swiss gold pendant watch decorated with enamel scene Circa 1690

Gold verge pendant watch
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A fine and rare Swiss 18K gold and enamel open faced pendant watch decorated with a scene of Susanna and the elders, circa 1690. The later case, movement, dial and bezel are made in circa 1730. A painted on enamel scene on the deep case back depicting a scene of Susanna at her bath surprised by two old men, the band painted with landscape vignettes, the bezel cast and chased with flowers and foliage, a loose ring pendant, the interior decorated with a polychrome enamel landscape, the enamelling attributed to Les Frères Huaud.
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White enamel dial with radial Roman hours, outer minute track with Arabic five-minute, pierced hands. A frosted gilt full plate movement with baluster pillars, fusee and chain, verge escapement, plain brass balance with flat balance spring, finely pierced and engraved continental cock, faceted red endstone, silver regulation disc, repeating work now redundant. Movement signed.
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Diameter: 45.5 mm
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Signed: Ls Arlaud Genève
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Restored soft enamel on the case, the movement has lacking elements and the dial has some hairlines.
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The last movement of this watch has a quarter repeating mechanism, the repeating cannot be activated.
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Susanna and the elders. The story is set in Babylon and tells how two elders of the community secretly desired Susanna, the wife of a prosperous jew and they plotted to seduce her. She was accustomed to going into her garden to bathe and one day the two elders hid and as soon as her maids had gone they sprang out naked on the unsuspecting girl. They threatened her that unless she gave herself to them they would swear she had committed adultery for which the penalty was death. She cried out and the elders carried out their threat. She was only saved by Daniel who cross-examined the elders and proved her innocence.
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Les Frères Huaut (or Huaud). The cases painted on enamel by ‘Les deux Frères Huaut’ were among the finest examples of their kind from the Geneva School and were not only highly valued when originally made, but remained as art treasures in the centuries that followed. Pierre I was the founder of the Huaud dynasty. He was born in 1612 in Geneva as the son of a French goldsmith Jean Huaud. He settled in Geneva in 1630 and three of his 11 children became famous enamellists like their father: Pierre II (1647-1698), Jean-Pierre (1655-1723) and Ami (1657-1724). The brothers were most likely trained by their father and worked with him. Pierre II started his own business around 1680. Jean-Pierre and Ami became partners in 1682 and were appointed painters to the Prussian court in 1686 when they moved to Berlin and started working for Elector Frederick William of Brandenburg (1620-1688). Among their most well-known works are Diana and Actaeon, The Judgement of Paris, The Holy Family, St. John the Baptist, The Nativity and The Adoration of the Shepherds.