Gear clock

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Gear clock is the generic term for clocks with a mechanical clockwork , mainly containing gears . In addition to purely mechanical watches, this also includes electromechanical movements and quartz watches with mechanically moving hands.

The term is used to differentiate it from the hourglasses that appeared around the same time as well as the historically older elementary clocks ( water clocks , sundials , astrolabes , fire clocks , candle clocks and star clocks ) and, on the other hand, to differentiate new clock technology such as quartz clocks, which are digital clocks with electro-optical numeric display or as Real-time clock no longer contain wheels and manage entirely without mechanically moving parts.

history

Drawing of the Astrarium by Giovanni de Dondi (1364)

The first wheel clocks can be traced back to around 1300. In 1306 St. Gotthard in Milan received the first verifiable wheel clock. Initially, wheel clocks were used in churches, monasteries, special towers and town halls as public clocks with only one hand showing the hours. With the increasing spread of the wheel clock, the watchmaker's job was formed as a split from the locksmith trade .

Early, monumental wheel clocks were mostly art clocks or were used for astronomical observations. They were accordingly elaborately worked and often provided with a large number of astronomical indications . At the same time, simple clocks with smaller dimensions developed, which made them very popular. The first wheel clocks with spring drive were fitted as early as 1440 (such as the grandfather clock Phillips of Burgundy, which was dated 1430) and by 1510 the Nuremberg clockmaker Peter Henlein was already producing high-quality transportable table clocks. However, in the 17th century, Vincenzo Viviani recommended the use of water clocks in the scientific field because of the usually high inaccuracy of wheel clocks (and hourglasses). Galileo Galilei discovered isochronism in 1583 , the basic requirement for the invention of the clock pendulum around 1650 by Christiaan Huygens . The first pendulum clock with a verge escapement designed by Huygens, which is now kept in the Rijksmuseum in Leiden, was built by the master Solomon Coster. The manufacture of really portable clocks and thus the development of the wheel clock into a pocket watch only became possible with the invention of the balance wheel , around 1674 also by Huygens.

The leadership in the further development and improvement of the wheel clocks, which had been in Nuremberg in the early 16th century and then in Augsburg , increasingly shifted to England in the middle of the 17th century . In the Black Forest, the Netherlands and France, other important centers of high quality watchmaking and distinctive regional watch types were formed, as well as in Vienna and Geneva .

With the beginning of the industrial revolution at the end of the 18th century and mass production in factories, the wheel clock finally made its breakthrough as an everyday item. From the pocket watch to the wristwatch it was only a small step at the beginning of the 20th century.

Mention in the literature

It is not known when the first wheel clock was built. However, the Italian poet and philosopher Dante Alighieri used the wheel clock as a comparison for the dance of the blessed in his comedy La Commedia (c. 1307–1320) . Gear clocks were thus already invented at this time and probably in general use:

Beatrix spoke it - how
spheres turn around the pole , so those Sel'gen now,
flaming, like comets, in glow and brightness!
 
How, well-arranged, the wheels of the clocks -
The last one seems to fly in full haste,
The first, when one looks at it, seems to rest -
 
So
each circle set itself in motion differently , whether it was
fast or sluggish, I valued his wealth.

literature

  • Rudolf Albrecht: The wheel clock. Rothenburg ob der Tauber [around 1916].
  • Ernst von Bassermann-Jordan : The history of the wheel clock with special consideration of the clocks of the Bavarian National Museum. Frankfurt am Main 1905.
  • Ernst von Bassermann-Jordan, Hans von Bertele : watches . Klinkhardt & Biermann, Braunschweig 1969.
  • Klaus Maurice: The German wheel clock. On the art and technology of the mechanical timepiece in the German-speaking world. 2 volumes. Munich 1976.
  • Jakob Raab: The oldest wheel clock in Nuremberg. In: Messages from the Germanisches Nationalmuseum. Volume 1, Nuremberg 1884–1886.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Fritz von Osterhausen: Callweys lexicon, Callwey, Munich 1999, ISBN 978-3766713537 , S. 262nd
  2. ↑ Ernst Zinner: From the early days of the wheel clock. From the weight clock to the spring clock. In: German Museum. Treatises and reports. Volume 22, 1954, No. 3, pp. 7-24.
  3. ↑ Clock with spring drive - 1430 : In: A question of technology .
  4. ^ Ernst von Bassermann-Jordan : The grandfather clock of Philip the good of Burgundy. Leipzig 1927.
  5. ^ Théodore Ungerer : La prétendue Horloge de Table de Philippe le Bon, Duc de Bourgogne 1430. In: L'Horloger. November 1930.
  6. ^ Alfred Beck: Neither real nor fake? A contribution to the consideration of the so-called Burgundy clock. In: The clock. Trade magazine for the watch, jewelry u. Silver merchandise management. Volume 3, 1959, pp. 20-22.
  7. ↑ Max Engelmann: The Burgundy spring clock around 1430. Halle an der Saale, 1927.
  8. ↑ Maximilian von Leber: Notice sur l'horloge gothique construite vers 1430 pour Philippe III, dit le Bon, duc de Bourgogne. Vienna 1877.
  9. ↑ Werner Friedrich Kümmel: The pulse and the problem of time measurement in the history of medicine. In: Medical History Journal. Volume 9, 1974, pp. 1–22, here: p. 4.
  10. ^ Dante Alighieri: The Divine Comedy , Fischer, Frankfurt 2008. ISBN 978-3596900084 .