Stewart Dalby Spending It
Antique clocks belong to an area of collecting, like Impressionist paintings, coins and vintage cars, which crashed in the early Nineties.
This was because they were bought for investment. Why grandfather and other clocks should have been sought for speculative purposes is curious.
Antique clocks are quintessentially English. It was not as if clocks had waves of Japanese and other foreign money lapping around them the way that Impressionist paintings did in the late Eighties. But speculated in they were, and prices for the best-known names reached unrealistic heights.
The father of British clockmakers was the late 17th-century craftsman, Thomas Tompion. In 1989, a rare Tompion blonde long-case (grandfather) sold for R8,8- million. The works of other well-known clockmakers from the 17th and 18th centuries, like Joseph Niggs, have similarly come back in price.
Nicholas Radeloff is another famous 17th-century craftsman. He was clockmaker to the Danish court. One of his famous clocks has a unique rolling ball-driven mechanism and an unusual “cross-beat” escapement (the part that regulates the clock’s motion).
Unlike the standard spring-driven clocks of the 17th century, this clock is powered by six agate balls which descend a central ball spiral under the force of gravity. The waiting balls are held in an ornate upper gallery while two roll downwards at a time.
They fall into a tray which operates a trip mechanism, pushing the next ball to take its place. Every 12 hours the balls are replaced. The design uses the two balls to equalise any imperfections and ensure a smooth crossover when the balls are changing, thus providing a reliable constant motive force.
Radeloff coupled this mechanism with an unusual “cross beat” escapement device for precise time-keeping. Instead of tempering the motive power with a singular weight foliate (a bar with pallets) the cross-beat uses two balanced foliates to exert a regulating influence on the wheel moving the clock’s hands.
The existence of Radeloff’s cross-beat clock had been forgotten until Professor Hans von Bertele, a noted horologist, came across it in a provincial English clock shop in the Fifties.
His search led him to Denmark, where he uncovered the only three other examples known to exist. As they are in museums they are unlikely to come on to the market.
A Tompion long-case, which would have fetched R2-million in the Eighties, can now be bought for R700 000. A bracket clock – a clock on a shelf or a wall – which would have cost R1,5-million, will now cost R600 000.
While there is a dedicated band of collectors who will pay good prices for these great names, there are also vast numbers of collectors who want clocks as furniture. Clocks are to furniture what watches are to jewellery. There are lots to choose from though prices are still pretty moderate.
Sanders says when you consider that you are buying something which is 150 to 200 years old, is finely made of rosewood or mahogany and is in good working order, you are getting a bargain. One example at Bonham’s is a bracket clock made by the not so famous Edward Pugh in 1760. It is made of walnut and on offer for R20 000.
James Collongridge, the specialist at Christie’s in London, deals in the middle market. He says he has sold an antique French brass carriage clock for R500. You can buy a good Victorian carriage clock for R2 000, and clocks by well-known Victorian clockmakers range between R10 000 and R50 000.
English clocks are always in demand, but French ones, which tend to be more decorative, are not selling for as much. However, Christie’s recently held a sale of French carriage clocks.
Carriage clocks are pieces that can be carried around the countryside. Napoleon Bonaparte took the first carriage clock ever made on his Egyptian campaign.