A lantern clock is a type of antique weight-driven wall clock, shaped like a lantern. They were the first type of clock widely used in private homes. [1] They probably originated before 1500 but only became common after 1600; [1] in Britain around 1620. They became obsolete in the 19th century.
There are two theories of the origin of the name "lantern clock". One is that it refers to brass, the main metal of which English lantern clocks are made. Clocks were first made on the continent, at first of iron with iron wheels, and then later with brass wheels. Later still, in France, Belgium and The Netherlands, clocks began to be made from brass. [2] Brass alloys were then called latten, and it seems likely that brass clocks would have been called "latten clocks" (or "latten horloge" or "latten uhr" in the native languages) to distinguish them from iron clocks, and that "lantern" could be an English interpretation or corruption of latten. The other is that the name derived from the shape; the clock resembles a rectangular lantern of that period, and like a lantern was hung on the wall.
In inventories of deceased clockmakers, lantern clocks are usually referred to as "house clocks", "chamber clocks" or simply "clocks", since in 17th century England they were almost the only type of domestic clocks that existed. It was only after a century had passed, when other types of domestic clocks began to be used in British houses, that more descriptive names for it appeared. Other names used for lantern clocks are "bedpost", "birdcage" or "Cromwellian" clocks. "Sheep's head clock" was a nickname term for a type of lantern clock that had an extremely large chapter ring covering almost the entire front.
The English lantern clock is closely related to lantern clocks that can be found on the European continent. A group of craftsmen from the Low Lands (Flanders) and France, of which some were clockmakers, had established themselves in London at the end of the 16th century. At the same time the middle classes in towns and cities of England began to prosper and the need arose for domestic clocks. Until that time clocks in English houses were confined to the nobility; ordinary people were dependent on sundials, or the tower clocks of local churches.
It is generally accepted that the first lantern clocks in England were made by Frauncoy Nowe and Nicholas Vallin, two Huguenots who had fled from the Low Lands.
Lantern clocks were made almost entirely of brass, whereas most earlier clocks had been constructed from iron and wood. Typical lantern clocks comprised a square case on ball or urn feet, a large circular dial (with a chapter ring extending beyond the width of the case on early examples), a single hour hand, and a large bell and finial. The clocks usually had ornate pierced fretwork on top of the frame.
The main style characteristics of English lantern clocks are similar to its Continental relatives: a wall clock with square bottom and top plates surmounted by a large bell, four corner pillars, a series of vertical plates positioned behind each other and a 30-hour movement with one or more weights. At the start of the 17th century, the style gradually evolved to a standard to which all clockmakers more or less complied. The guild supervised the clockmakers, who were compelled to work within a prescribed method. Suppliers to the clockmakers' trade contributed to this general style as well. For example, the brass founders supplied stylistically identical clock posts to several clockmakers. In contrast to the Dutch variants, such as stool clocks, English lantern clocks were entirely made of metal (brass and steel).
Lantern clocks were originally weight-driven: usually one weight for time keeping and a second for striking. A few later lantern-style clocks were constructed with spring mechanisms, and many surviving examples of the original weight-driven type have been converted to spring or pendulum mechanisms.
In only a few decades, the lantern clock became very popular in London and from there its popularity spread to the entire country. This is evident from the large number of lantern clocks that still exist. Dozens of clockmakers produced great numbers of these clocks in the city of London during the 17th century. This huge productivity was the result of the high demand for this popular clock in combination with an effective guild system. In 1631 King Charles I granted a charter for a clockmaker guild in London: the Worshipful Company of Clockmakers, which exists to this day.
Many of the well-known clockmakers from that era were freemen of this guild. Before a clockmaker could become a freeman, able to set up his own shop, he had to spend seven years as an apprentice learning the trade. This ensured independent clockmakers a plentiful supply of apprentices, who were also cheap labourers who helped to attain this high productivity.
Many small companies were established in Lothbury in London that functioned as suppliers for the clockmakers. A clockmaker could benefit from the services of brass founders who supplied cast brass clock parts, dial plates, finials, pillars, frets etc., or employ engravers who would carry out the engraving of the dial plates and frets. The guild assured the quality of the products that left the clockmakers' workshops.
Style characteristics were copied from prints that were available for craftsmen. Under the influence of the Renaissance, prints with motives and patterns from the Classical antiquity found their way to the workshops. They served as examples for the clock pillars that were inspired by columns from Greek temples. During the 17th century the tulip became very popular to an extent of a real tulip mania. Prints with pictures of tulips were a rewarding subject for the adornment of the dial plates of lantern clocks. In the early 17th century, lantern clocks got their characteristic shape, which hardly changed during the 17th and halfway through the next century as a result of all this.
The London Clockmakers equipped their lantern clocks with four pillars inspired by classical columns. Attached to these pillars are classical vase-shaped finials and well-shaped feet. To those finials a bell strap is attached that spreads from four corners and holds a bell. To hide the hammer and the clock movement from the spectator three frets are attached to the finials. The front fret is pierced and engraved whereas the two side frets are pierced but usually left blank. The front of the clock case consists of an engraved dial plate on which a circular dial ring is attached. Almost all lantern clocks originally had just one clock hand to indicate the hours. A standard lantern clock strikes the hours on a large bell and is often equipped with an alarm that rings the same bell. Two doors provide access to the movement and are hinged at the sides of the clock. One or more weights are hanging from ropes or chains at the bottom of the clock.
Lantern clocks were produced in vast numbers during the decades before the pioneering invention of the pendulum by the Dutch scientist Christiaan Huygens in 1656. Before this invention, lantern clocks used a balance wheel lacking a balance spring for their timekeeping element, which limited their accuracy to perhaps 15 minutes per day. Shortly after Huygens' invention, the bob pendulum was introduced in England, and most English clockmakers adopted the new system quickly. The pendulum increased the accuracy of clocks so greatly that many existing clocks were converted, with pendulums being added at the back. Measuring time became much more accurate, but most clockmakers kept building lantern clocks without minute hands: this may be just a matter of tradition. The result was that clockmakers started to develop other types of domestic clocks. Longcase clocks with 8-day movements made lantern clocks obsolete, and gradually lantern clocks disappeared from the London interiors in the first decades of the 18th century. In rural areas lantern clocks were produced until the beginning of the 19th century, and in those years they were also exported to countries like Turkey, and supplied with oriental numbers on their dials. In the Victorian era there was a revival of interest in antique lantern clocks. Unfortunately this also meant that many clocks of renowned makers were stripped of their movements, which were replaced by 'modern' winding movements. Nowadays unmodified original lantern clocks are very rare.
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 '40s. Pendulum clocks are now kept mostly for their decorative and antique value.
The gridiron pendulum was a temperature-compensated clock pendulum invented by British clockmaker John Harrison around 1726 and later modified by John Ellicott. It was used in precision clocks. In ordinary clock pendulums, the pendulum rod expands and contracts with changes in temperature. The period of the pendulum's swing depends on its length, so a pendulum clock's rate varied with changes in ambient temperature, causing inaccurate timekeeping. The gridiron pendulum consists of alternating parallel rods of two metals with different thermal expansion coefficients, such as steel and brass. The rods are connected by a frame in such a way that their different thermal expansions compensate for each other, so that the overall length of the pendulum, and thus its period, stays constant with temperature.
A clockmaker is an artisan who makes and/or repairs clocks. Since almost all clocks are now factory-made, most modern clockmakers only repair clocks. Modern clockmakers may be employed by jewellers, antique shops, and places devoted strictly to repairing clocks and watches. Clockmakers must be able to read blueprints and instructions for numerous types of clocks and time pieces that vary from antique clocks to modern time pieces in order to fix and make clocks or watches. The trade requires fine motor coordination as clockmakers must frequently work on devices with small gears and fine machinery.
A clock face is the part of an analog clock 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.
An escapement is a mechanical linkage in mechanical watches and clocks that gives impulses to the timekeeping element and periodically releases the gear train to move forward, advancing the clock's hands. The impulse action transfers energy to the clock's timekeeping element to replace the energy lost to friction during its cycle and keep the timekeeper oscillating. The escapement is driven by force from a coiled spring or a suspended weight, transmitted through the timepiece's gear train. Each swing of the pendulum or balance wheel releases a tooth of the escapement's escape wheel, allowing the clock's gear train to advance or "escape" by a fixed amount. This regular periodic advancement moves the clock's hands forward at a steady rate. At the same time, the tooth gives the timekeeping element a push, before another tooth catches on the escapement's pallet, returning the escapement to its "locked" state. The sudden stopping of the escapement's tooth is what generates the characteristic "ticking" sound heard in operating mechanical clocks and watches.
A grandfather clock is a tall, freestanding, weight-driven pendulum clock, with the pendulum held inside the tower or waist of the case. Clocks of this style are commonly 1.8–2.4 metres (6–8 feet) tall with an enclosed pendulum and weights, suspended by either cables or chains, which have to be occasionally calibrated to keep the proper time. The case often features elaborately carved ornamentation on the hood, which surrounds and frames the dial, or clock face.
In horology, a movement, also known as a caliber or calibre, is the mechanism of a watch or timepiece, as opposed to the case, which encloses and protects the movement, and the face, which displays the time. The term originated with mechanical timepieces, whose clockwork movements are made of many moving parts. The movement of a digital watch is more commonly known as a module.
The vergeescapement is the earliest known type of mechanical escapement, the mechanism in a mechanical clock that controls its rate by allowing the gear train to advance at regular intervals or 'ticks'. Verge escapements were used from the late 13th century until the mid 19th century in clocks and pocketwatches. The name verge comes from the Latin virga, meaning stick or rod.
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, up to twelve times at 12:00 midnight.
A fusee is a cone-shaped pulley with a helical groove around it, wound with a cord or chain attached to the mainspring barrel of antique mechanical watches and clocks. It was used from the 15th century to the early 20th century to improve timekeeping by equalizing the uneven pull of the mainspring as it ran down. Gawaine Baillie stated of the fusee, "Perhaps no problem in mechanics has ever been solved so simply and so perfectly."
The banjo clock, or banjo timepiece, is an American wall clock with a banjo-shaped case. It was invented by Simon Willard, originally of Grafton, Massachusetts, later of Roxbury, Massachusetts, and patented in 1802. The banjo clock normally lacks a striking mechanism and indicates time only by its hands and dial, for which reason some horologists may insist upon calling it a timepiece rather than a true clock. In popular usage though, no such distinction is made.
A Japanese clock is a mechanical clock that has been made to tell traditional Japanese time, a system in which daytime and nighttime are always divided into six periods whose lengths consequently change with the season. Mechanical clocks were introduced into Japan by Jesuit missionaries or Dutch merchants. These clocks were of the lantern clock design, typically made of brass or iron, and used the relatively primitive verge and foliot escapement. Tokugawa Ieyasu owned a lantern clock of European manufacture.
A lighthouse clock is a type of mantel clock manufactured in the U.S. from 1818 through 1830s by the American clockmaker Simon Willard, having the dial and works exposed beneath a glass dome on a tapered, cylindrical body.
The Salisbury Cathedral clock is a large iron-framed tower clock without a dial, in Salisbury Cathedral, England. Thought to date from about 1386, it is a well-preserved example of the earliest type of mechanical clock, called verge and foliot clocks, and is said to be the oldest working clock in the world, although similar claims are made for other clocks. Previously in a bell-tower which was demolished in 1790, the clock was restored to working condition in 1956 and is on display in the North nave aisle of the cathedral, close to the West front.
In mechanical horology, a remontoire is a small secondary source of power, a weight or spring, which runs the timekeeping mechanism and is itself periodically rewound by the timepiece's main power source, such as a mainspring. It was used in a few precision clocks and watches to place the source of power closer to the escapement, thereby increasing the accuracy by evening out variations in drive force caused by unevenness of the friction in the geartrain. In spring-driven precision clocks, a gravity remontoire is sometimes used to replace the uneven force delivered by the mainspring running down by the more constant force of gravity acting on a weight. In turret clocks, it serves to separate the large forces needed to drive the hands from the modest forces needed to drive the escapement which keeps the pendulum swinging. A remontoire should not be confused with a maintaining power spring, which is used only to keep the timepiece going while it is being wound.
A turret clock or tower clock is a clock designed to be mounted high in the wall of a building, usually in a clock tower, in public buildings such as churches, university buildings, and town halls. As a public amenity to enable the community to tell the time, it has a large face visible from far away, and often a striking mechanism which rings bells upon the hours.
Salomon Coster was a Dutch clockmaker of the Hague, who in 1657 was the first to make a pendulum clock, which had been invented by Dutch mathematician Christiaan Huygens (1629-1695). Coster died a sudden death in 1659.
The history of timekeeping devices dates back to when ancient civilizations first observed astronomical bodies as they moved across the sky. Devices and methods for keeping time have gradually improved through a series of new inventions, starting with measuring time by continuous processes, such as the flow of liquid in water clocks, to mechanical clocks, and eventually repetitive, oscillatory processes, such as the swing of pendulums. Oscillating timekeepers are used in all modern timepieces.
Ahasuerus Fromanteel was a clockmaker, the first maker of pendulum clocks in Britain.
The Dingwall Beloe Lecture Series is the result of bequests by Eric Dingwall, formerly an Assistant Keeper of Printed Books in the British Museum, and to the Clockmakers Company by Reginald Beloe TD, the noted horological collector and Master of the Company in 1977.
