A clock face is the part of an analog clock (or watch) that displays time through the use of a flat dial with reference marks, and revolving pointers turning on concentric shafts at the center, called hands. In its most basic, globally recognized form, the periphery of the dial is numbered 1 through 12 indicating the hours in a 12-hour cycle, and a short hour hand makes two revolutions in a day. A long minute hand makes one revolution every hour. The face may also include a second hand, which makes one revolution per minute. The term is less commonly used for the time display on digital clocks and watches.
A second type of clock face is the 24-hour analog dial, widely used in military and other organizations that use 24-hour time. This is similar to the 12-hour dial above, except it has hours numbered 1–24 (or 0–23) around the outside, and the hour hand makes only one revolution per day. Some special-purpose clocks, such as timers and sporting event clocks, are designed for measuring periods less than one hour. Clocks can indicate the hour with Roman numerals or Hindu–Arabic numerals, or with non-numeric indicator marks. The two numbering systems have also been used in combination, with the prior indicating the hour and the latter the minute. Longcase clocks (grandfather clocks) typically use Roman numerals for the hours. Clocks using only Arabic numerals first began to appear in the mid-18th century. [citation needed]
The clock face is so familiar that the numbers are often omitted and replaced with unlabeled graduations (marks), particularly in the case of watches. Occasionally, markings of any sort are dispensed with, and the time is read by the angles of the hands.[citation needed]
Reading a modern clock face
'12:14' in both analog and digital representations. In the analog clock, the minute hand is on "14" minutes, and the hour hand is moving from "12" to "1" – this indicates a time of 12:14.A ship's radio room wall clock during the age of wireless telegraphy showing '10:09' and 36 seconds'. The green and red shaded areas denote 3 minute periods during which radio silence was maintained to facilitate listening for distress calls at 2182kHz and 500kHz respectively.
Most modern clocks have the numbers 1 through 12 printed at equally spaced intervals around the periphery of the face with the 12 at the top, indicating the hour, and on many models, sixty dots or lines evenly spaced in a ring around the outside of the dial, indicating minutes and seconds. The time is read by observing the placement of several "hands", which emanate from the centre of the dial:
A short, thick "hour" hand;
A long, thinner "minute" hand;
On some models, a very thin "second" or "sweep" hand
All three hands continuously rotate around the dial in a clockwise direction – in the direction of increasing numbers.
The second, or sweep, hand moves relatively quickly, taking a full minute (sixty seconds) to make a complete rotation from 12 to 12. For every rotation of the second hand, the minute hand will move from one minute mark to the next.
The minute hand rotates more slowly around the dial. It takes one hour (sixty minutes) to make a complete rotation from 12 to 12. For every rotation of the minute hand, the hour hand will move from one hour mark to the next.
The hour hand moves slowest of all, taking half a day (twelve hours) to make a complete rotation. It starts from "12" at midnight, makes one rotation until it is pointing at "12" again at noon, and then makes another rotation until it is pointing at "12" again at midnight of the next morning.
The word clock derives from the medieval Latin word for "bell"; clocca, and has cognates in many European languages. Clocks spread to England from the Low Countries,[1] so the English word came from the Middle Low German and Middle Dutch Klocke.[2] The first mechanical clocks, built in 13th-century Europe, were striking clocks: their purpose was to ring bells upon the canonical hours, to call the local community to prayer.[citation needed] These were tower clocks installed in bell towers in public places, to ensure that the bells were audible over a wide area. Soon after these first mechanical clocks were in place clockmakers realized that their wheels could be used to drive an indicator on a dial on the outside of the tower, where it could be widely seen, so the local population could tell the time between the hourly strikes.
Before the late 14th century, a fixed hand (often a carving literally shaped like a hand) indicated the hour by pointing to numbers on a rotating dial; after this time, the current convention of a rotating hand on a fixed dial was adopted. Minute hands (so named because they indicated the small, or minute, divisions of the hour) only came into regular use around 1690, after the invention of the pendulum and anchor escapement increased the precision of time-telling enough to justify it.[3] In some precision clocks, a third hand, which rotated once a minute, was added in a separate subdial. This was called the "second-minute" hand (because it measured the secondary minute divisions of the hour), which was shortened to "second" hand.[3] The convention of the hands moving clockwise evolved in imitation of the sundial. In the Northern hemisphere, where the clock face originated, the shadow of the gnomon on a horizontal sundial moves clockwise during the day.[4]
French decimal clock (with the 24 standard hours included around the outside)
During the French Revolution in 1793, in connection with its Republican calendar, France attempted to introduce a decimal time system.[5] This had 10 decimal hours in the day, 100 decimal minutes per hour, and 100 decimal seconds per minute. Therefore, the decimal hour was more than twice as long (144 min) as the present hour, the decimal minute was slightly longer than the present minute (86.4 seconds) and the decimal second was slightly shorter (0.864 sec) than the present second. Clocks were manufactured with this alternate face, usually combined with traditional hour markings. However, it did not catch on, and France discontinued the mandatory use of decimal time on 7 April 1795, although some French cities used decimal time until 1801.
Stylistic development
A modern quartz clock with a 24-hour faceA simple 24 hour clock showing the approximate position of the sun
Until the last quarter of the 17th century, hour markings were etched into metal faces and the recesses filled with black wax. Subsequently, higher contrast and improved readability was achieved with white enamel plaques painted with black numbers. Initially, the numbers were printed on small, individual plaques mounted on a brass substructure. This was not a stylistic decision, rather enamel production technology had not yet achieved the ability to create large pieces of enamel. The "13-piece face" was an early attempt to create an entirely white enamel face. As the name suggests, it was composed of 13 enamel plaques: 12 numbered wedges fitted around a circle. The first single-piece enamel faces, not unlike those in production today, began to appear c.1735.
It is customary for modern advertisements to display clocks and watches set to approximately 10:10 or 1:50,[6] as this V-shaped arrangement roughly makes a smile, imitates a human figure with raised arms, and leaves the watch company's logo unobscured by the hands.[7]
In the 1970s, German designer Tian Harlan invented the Chromachron, a wristwatch with a clock face that has no dials but a disc with pie-shaped pattern rotating by the minute over color patterns representing both hours and minutes.[8]
Technological obsolescence
In the 2010s, some United Kingdom schools started replacing analogue clocks in examination halls with digital clocks because an increasing number of pupils were unable to read analogue clocks.[9] Smartphone and computer clocks are often digital rather than analogue, and proponents of replacing analogue clock faces argue that they have become technologically obsolete.[10] However, reading analogue clocks is still part of American elementary school curricula; proponents of analogue clocks argue that their inclusion in the curriculum reinforces basic mathematical concepts that are taught in elementary school.[11]
1 2 Milham, Willis I. (1945). Time and Timekeepers. New York: MacMillan. p.195. ISBN0-7808-0008-7.
↑ Lathrop, Don Haven (1996). "Why is clockwise Clockwise?". Workshop Hints. Donn Haven Lathrop, 2008 (originally British Horological Institute). Archived from the original on 2011-11-15. Retrieved 2008-06-27.
↑ Roni Zirinski (2005). Ad Hoc Arabism: Advertising, Culture and Technology in Saudi Arabia. Peter Lang. p.42. ISBN978-0-8204-7445-8. [I]n almost all the advertisements for timepieces, the time is 10:10 (or somewhere between 10:08 and 10:11). This arrangement of the watch hands, creating a V-for-Victory sign, is an advertising technique meant to emphasize the name of the company, which usually appears in the upper part of the watch; it is common practice both in the West and in the Far East.
A clock or chronometer is a device that measures and displays time. The clock is one of the oldest human inventions, meeting the need to measure intervals of time shorter than the natural units such as the day, the lunar month, and the year. Devices operating on several physical processes have been used over the millennia.
A pendulum clock is a clock that uses a pendulum, a swinging weight, as its timekeeping element. The advantage of a pendulum for timekeeping is that it is an approximate harmonic oscillator: It swings back and forth in a precise time interval dependent on its length, and resists swinging at other rates. From its invention in 1656 by Christiaan Huygens, inspired by Galileo Galilei, until the 1930s, the pendulum clock was the world's most precise timekeeper, accounting for its widespread use. Throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, pendulum clocks in homes, factories, offices, and railroad stations served as primary time standards for scheduling daily life, work shifts, and public transportation. Their greater accuracy allowed for the faster pace of life which was necessary for the Industrial Revolution. The home pendulum clock was replaced by less-expensive synchronous electric clocks in the 1930s and 1940s. Pendulum clocks are now kept mostly for their decorative and antique value.
A watch is a portable timepiece intended to be carried or worn by a person. It is designed to keep a consistent movement despite the motions caused by the person's activities. A wristwatch is designed to be worn around the wrist, attached by a watch strap or other type of bracelet, including metal bands, leather straps, or any other kind of bracelet. A pocket watch is designed for a person to carry in a pocket, often attached to a chain. A stopwatch is a watch that measures intervals of time.
An analog watch (American) or analogue watch is a watch whose display is not digital but rather analog with a traditional clock face. The name is an example of a retronym; it was coined to distinguish analog watches, which had simply been called "watches", from newer digital watches. It strictly refers to the design of the display, regardless of the timekeeping technology used within the watch movement or module, although its counterpart, "digital watch", usually connotes digital electronics in both. A digital watch is one in which the time is displayed as a series of digits, e.g. "04:32". An analog watch is one in which the display is not digital, but is indicated (typically) by the continuous motion of one, two, or three rotating pointers or hands pointing to numbers arrayed on a circular dial.
A pocket watch is a watch that is made to be carried in a pocket, as opposed to a wristwatch, which is strapped to the wrist.
A chronograph is a specific type of watch that is used as a stopwatch combined with a display watch. A basic chronograph has hour and minute hands on the main dial to tell the time, a small seconds hand to tell that the watch is running, and a seconds hand on the main dial usually equipped with a sweeping movement for precision accompanied by a minutes sub dial for the stopwatch. Another sub dial to measure the hours of the stopwatch may also be included on a chronograph. The stopwatch can be started, stopped, and reset to zero at any time by the user by operating pushers usually placed adjacent to the crown. More complex chronographs often use additional complications and can have multiple sub-dials to measure more aspects of the stopwatch such as fractions of a second as well as other helpful things such as the moon phase and the local 24-hour time. In addition, many modern chronographs include tachymeters on the bezels for rapid calculations of speed or distance. Louis Moinet invented the chronograph in 1816 for use in tracking astronomical objects. Chronographs soon found a widespread use in artillery fire in the mid to late 1800s. Over time, the chronograph found its use to be in several different fields, such as aircraft piloting, auto racing, diving and submarine maneuvering.
A world clock is a clock which displays the time for various cities around the world. The display can take various forms:
A repeater is a complication in a mechanical watch or clock that chimes the hours and often minutes at the press of a button. There are many types of repeater, from the simple repeater which merely strikes the number of hours, to the minute repeater which chimes the time down to the minute, using separate tones for hours, quarter hours, and minutes. They originated before widespread artificial illumination, to allow the time to be determined in the dark, and were also used by the visually impaired. Now they are mostly valued as expensive novelties by watch and clock enthusiasts. Repeaters should not be confused with striking clocks or watches, which do not strike on demand, but merely at regular intervals.
In horology, a complication is any feature of a timepiece beyond the display of hours, minutes and seconds. A timepiece indicating only hours, minutes and seconds is known as a simple movement. Common complications include date or day-of-the-week indicators, alarms, chronographs (stopwatches), and automatic winding mechanisms. Complications may be found in any clock, but they are most notable in mechanical watches where the small size makes them difficult to design and assemble. A typical date-display chronograph may have up to 250 parts, while a particularly complex watch may have a thousand or more parts. Watches with several complications are referred to as grandes complications.
A striking clock is a clock that sounds the hours audibly on a bell, gong, or other audible device. In 12-hour striking, used most commonly in striking clocks today, the clock strikes once at 1:00 am, twice at 2:00 am, continuing in this way up to twelve times at 12:00 mid-day, then starts again, striking once at 1:00 pm, twice at 2:00 pm, and the pattern continues up to twelve times at 12:00 midnight.
A digital clock displays the time digitally, as opposed to an analogue clock.
Decimal time is the representation of the time of day using units which are decimally related. This term is often used specifically to refer to the French Republican calendar time system used in France from 1794 to 1800, during the French Revolution, which divided the day into 10 decimal hours, each decimal hour into 100 decimal minutes and each decimal minute into 100 decimal seconds, as opposed to the more familiar standard time, which divides the day into 24 hours, each hour into 60 minutes and each minute into 60 seconds.
George Daniels, CBE, FBHI, FSA, AHCI was an English horologist who was considered by some to be one of the best in the world in the field of luxury mechanical watches and timepieces during his lifetime. He was a watchmaker who all but completely built 23 pocket watches and 2 wrist watches as well as a number of clocks all by hand. Daniels commented often that "a watch has historic, intellectual, technical, aesthetic, useful and amusing qualities" and he sought to make watches that did each of these things while consistently improving on the technical and horological aspects of each watch he made. As at December 2022, George Daniels watches only sat behind Patek and Rolex watches by reference to value and number of watches sold, with 6 watches achieving prices in excess of USD$1.5 million. This makes George Daniels watches the first independently made watches to achieve this result.
Clocks and watches with a 24-hour analog dial have an hour hand that makes one complete revolution, 360°, in a day. The more familiar 12-hour analog dial has an hour hand that makes two complete revolutions in a day.
St Mark's Clock is housed in the Clock Tower on the Piazza San Marco in Venice, Italy, adjoining the Procuratie Vecchie. The first clock housed in the tower was built and installed by Gian Paolo and Gian Carlo Rainieri, father and son, between 1496 and 1499, and was one of a number of large public astronomical clocks erected throughout Europe during the 14th and 15th centuries. The clock has had an eventful horological history, and been the subject of many restorations, some controversial.
A mechanical watch is a watch that uses a clockwork mechanism to measure the passage of time, as opposed to quartz watches which function using the vibration modes of a piezoelectric quartz tuning fork, or radio watches, which are quartz watches synchronized to an atomic clock via radio waves. A mechanical watch is driven by a mainspring which must be wound either periodically by hand or via a self-winding mechanism. Its force is transmitted through a series of gears to power the balance wheel, a weighted wheel which oscillates back and forth at a constant rate. A device called an escapement releases the watch's wheels to move forward a small amount with each swing of the balance wheel, moving the watch's hands forward at a constant rate. The escapement is what makes the 'ticking' sound which is heard in an operating mechanical watch. Mechanical watches evolved in Europe in the 17th century from spring powered clocks, which appeared in the 15th century.
In horology, a wheel train is the gear train of a mechanical watch or clock. Although the term is used for other types of gear trains, the long history of mechanical timepieces has created a traditional terminology for their gear trains which is not used in other applications of gears.
Greubel Forsey is a Swiss watchmaking company specializing in complicated, high-end timepieces. It was launched in 2004 by Robert Greubel and Stephen Forsey and is based in La Chaux-de-Fonds, Switzerland.
A clock position, or clock bearing, is the direction of an object observed from a vehicle, typically a vessel or an aircraft, relative to the orientation of the vehicle to the observer. The vehicle must be considered to have a front, a back, a left side and a right side. These quarters may have specialized names, such as bow and stern for a vessel, or nose and tail for an aircraft. The observer then measures or observes the angle made by the intersection of the line of sight to the longitudinal axis, the dimension of length, of the vessel, using the clock analogy.
A Boule de Genève is a type of pendant watch in the shape of a small ball or sphere originating from Geneva, (Switzerland). The dial is usually at the bottom of the sphere facing the floor, at the opposite side of the jump ring on the upper part of the sphere, although there are examples with a front view face. Usually, they were arabic numeral dials, sometimes Roman, and from the 1950s different types of hour markers were also used. This objet de vertu frequently came with a matching brooch, chain or chatelaine.
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