French silver watch with single hand and alarm Circa 1650

Floral decorated pocket watch
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A very fine French silver pre-balance spring, type pendant watch with single hand and alarm, circa 1650.
Gilt brass full-plate movement, turned baluster pillars, fusee with gut line, verge escapement, two-arm steel balance without spring, pierced florally engraved balance cock with small foot secured by a screw, alarm barrel with pierced and engraved foliate decoration, steel alarm train with double-ended hammer striking a bell in the back of the case, worm and wheel regulation with pierced blued steel feet and silver numbered disc.
Pierced and engraved case with foliage and flowers, hinged cover decorated to match, cast pendant.
Gilt brass dial plate with stiff-leaf engraved decoration, silver chapter ring with radial Roman numerals and half-hour markers, inner gilt brass alarm disc engraved with Arabic numerals and with florally engraved center, blued steel tulip alarm pointer. Fine blued steel hand.
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Diameter: 47 mm
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Signed: Fonnerau à La Rochelle
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Comparable watches are shown in Clutton/Daniels “Watches” fig. 149-169. Zacharie Fonnerau a La Rochelle was a major Geneva-based watchmaker and master in La Rochelle from 1641-1683. He is known for his important form watches from the 17th century, amongst others in tulip shape.
Zacharie Fonnereau Originally from Geneva, he traveled to Lyon in 1618, became a Compagnon in 1622, and was working in La Rochelle, France, by 1641. There he became a Master, in 1641. Fonnereau died shortly afterward. He is known to have signed a cruciform watch “Fonnereau à La Rochelle”. “Dictionnaire des horlogers genevois” by Osvaldo Patrizzi 1998.