Inventory no. 35592 - Former Display Label
German ASTROLABE CLOCK
?c.1686
Gilt brass, steel, brass, and silver. Signed: "Johann Leonhardt Bommel. In Nürnberg"; undated.
There is a horizontal verge escapement. The main dial on this side of the clock includes the following features:
1. A chapter ring marked in hours, I-XII and I-XII; the a.m. times are on the left, the p.m. times on the right.
2. An astrolabe rete, rotating within the chapter ring, showing the ecliptic and 16 stars.
3. A solar index arm (marked with a symbol of the Sun) which moves over the hour ring and the rete. This index shows the hour on the chapter ring and the position of the Sun on the ecliptic circle of the rete.
4. A lunar index arm (marked with a symbol of the Moon) which moves above the solar index. This shows, on the chapter ring, the time that would be given by a sundial used in moonlight. The other end of this index shows the age of the Moon, both by means of a pointer on a scale marked 1-291/2, and pictorially through a circular opening. It is also engraved with a lunar aspectarium.
5. A blued-steel index arm (in the form of a dragon) indicating the nodes of the Moon. The coincidence of this index with those of the Sun and Moon indicates eclipses.
The clock can be set, by means of the dial in the upper left corner, to strike on either a 12- or a 24-hour system. The last hour struck is marked (by the blued-steel hand for the 12-hour system, and the gilt hand for the 24-hour system) on the dial on the left-hand side of the clock. The quarters struck are similarly indicated by the dial on the right-hand side. The dial at the bottom left gives the dominical letter; that on the right serves to set an alarm mechanism.
On the back, the main dial shows hours and minutes. This is surrounded by a calendar giving the date and the name of the saint whose feast it is. The upper right dial gives the number of the year in the metonic cycle, the lower left one the day of the week by its planetary symbol.
This clock presents several problems. Only the movement appears to be of the late seventeenth century. It seems certain that the cherubim and the lions have been added to an early base; like the basket top, they were probably added in the nineteenth century. The dials and the side panels also probably date from the nineteenth century. Johann Leonhard Bommel is recorded in documents in the Staatsarchiv Nürnberg about 1686, and again in 1696 and 1725. It is assumed that he became free of the Nuremberg guild around 1686, in which case the clock movement might be his masterpiece (i.e. a qualifying piece made at the end of his term of apprenticeship), but even the signature may be a later addition.
[24-43]
Lent by Miss Ellen Willmott