English half quarter repeating verge pocket watch Circa 1739

Pair cased pocket watch “Penelope and the Suitors” by John Ellicot
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A fine, rare English half quarter repeating pair cased verge pocket watch “Penelope and the Suitors”, circa 1739.
Two cases: firegilt Repoussé outer case with depiction of Penelope and her suitors and a large lateral hinge; gold inner case with decorated engraved foliate scrolls on pierced band, a mascaron and view of a town, a signed silver movement protection cap, a pusher for repetition via pendant and a rear bell. The dial is enamel with Arabic numerals and “Poker & Beetle” hands. And the signed firegilt full plate movement is keywind with applied engraved and florally pierced decorations, chain/fusee, moulded movement pillars, three arm brass balance, pierced balance cock with shell and large chatoned diamond endstone.
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Diameter: 50 mm
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Weight: 140 g
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Signed: John Ellicot, London
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John Ellicott (1706-1791)
 One of the most eminent English watch- and clock-makers, established himself in business about 1728 and became a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1738. Ellicot was the inventor of a compensation pendulum and paid great attention to the use of the cylinder escapement only a few years after its improvement by Graham. In some of his later pieces the cylinders were made of ruby.
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Penelope
Penelope is the wife of the main character, the king of Ithaca, Odysseus and daughter of Icarius and his wife Periboea. She only has one son by Odysseus, Telemachus, who was born just before Odysseus was called to fight in the Trojan War. She waits twenty years for the final return of her husband, during which she has a hard time snubbing marriage proposals from odious suitors. On Odysseus’s return, disguised as an old beggar, he finds that Penelope has remained faithful. She has devised tricks to delay her suitors, one of which is to pretend to be weaving a burial shroud for Odysseus’s elderly father Laertes and claiming that she will choose a suitor when she has finished. Every night for three years, she undoes part of the shroud, until Melantho, one of twelve unfaithful serving women, discovers her chicanery and reveals it to the suitors.