2717
FRANZ STERL IN MAUER.
A wonderfully elegant and rare year duration Viennese Laterndluhr. The case has an ogee moulded pedimented roof with lift off hood and opening hood door, edge inlaid with maplewood. The slender trunk has a typical lift out door with a round topped glass aperture. The pendulum box, again with a lift out door, has brass stabilizing screws to the side and an internal cut out in the floor presumably to aid the duration.
The year duration movement has only a small number of wheels mounted between the plates. The majority of the wheel work is mounted on cocks and bridges on the front plate and, therefore, visible through the skeletonised centre of the dial. Due to the necessity for heavy driving weights the clock has been given a geared winding system which enables the weights to be easily wound up. This is an enormous improvement on most Viennese year duration clocks. There are end stops in a lot of the train and the clock has a Graham deadbeat escapement and finely pierced wheel work.
The enamel dial is signed for the maker ‘Sterl in Mauer.’ It has a large heavily dished engine turned bezel with superb fire gilding. There is a subsidiary seconds dial, again of enamel, supported on a well fretted flower like brass support. The hands are nicely shaped and of blued steel with large counter balances to both hands.
The pendulum is unusual, but typical of this maker, having a thin brass rod and very heavy brass bob. The two large weights hang from a beautifully shaped and fretted pulley with a graceful yoke arrangement.
The importance of this rare timepiece cannot be under estimated. An identical clock by this maker can be found in the Uhren Museum in Vienna. It is illustrated in the Museum Catalogue pages 118 - 119.
Length: 56" (140 cms.)
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The maker Franz Sterl is noted as a Viennese Master, the highest form of clockmaker, between 1820 and his death in 1855.
