French 20 Carat gold Louis XV verge pocket watch Circa 1750

Gold and enamel verge by Julien Le Roy
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A very fine and rare French 20 Carat gold, enamel and diamond-set verge pocket watch, circa 1750. Louis XV case with chased border, the bezel is decorated with a continuous painted on enamel townscape and countryside, a polychrome enamel scene depicting Erato and two putti in a wooded landscape on the back, the interior of the back painted with buildings in a landscape, the pendant set with a single old cut diamond.
White enamel dial with radial Roman numerals, outer minute track, Arabic five minute numerals, rose cut diamond set hands. A gilt brass full plate movement, pentagonal baluster pillars, fusee with chain, verge escapement, micrometric potence adjustment, plain three arm steel balance, flat balance spring, pierced and engraved continental balance cock, polished steel endplate, silver regulation dial. Movement signed.
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Diameter: 45 mm
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Signed: Julien Le Roy Paris
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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 correct 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. The steel end-piece (coqueret) allowed oil to be retained in the balance pivots to diminish frictional force and was quickly adopted by other watchmakers. He was the inventor of dumb repeating watches, too; in 1740, he created a new arrangement that enlarged the area allotted to the repeating work. 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 worldwide, such as the Louvre and the Victoria and Albert Museum.