Bonbruict, à Blois

AN EXCEPTIONAL GOLD AND ENAMEL VERGE WATCH DEPICTING SCENES FROM THE LIFE OF THE MADONNA THE ENAMEL PAINTING ATTRIBUTED TO ROBERT VAUQUER CIRCA 1660

• Movement: gilded full plate, verge escapement, polished steel two-arm balance with chamfered rim, decoratively pierced and floral engraved balance cock with long foot, worm and wheel set-up with silver indication plate and blued steel pointer, blued steel surrounding brackets, unusual turned baluster pillars, fusee and gut line, signed Bonbruict à Blois
• Dial: white enamel chapter ring with Roman numerals, restored polychrome re-painted enamel centre depicting The Virgin with St. John the Baptist handing the Christ child a bird, gilded outer border with quarter hour divisions, gilded baluster-form hand with floriate tip
• Case: polychrome enamel painted gold case with restoration, scenes after Simon Vouet depicting to the lid: The Virgin and Child; the inside of the lid: Rest on the Flight into Egypt; the back: The Virgin and Child with St. Joseph, Elizabeth and St John the Baptist within a classical setting, the Virgin holding a tethered dove; inside back with a gentleman and a lady within a classical landscape with an entrance gateway behind; the rounded case sides with four pastoral vignettes separated by bouquets of flowers, plain ring pendant
diameter 53mm

Provenance:
Robert Vauquer (1625-1670) was one of the most accomplished enamel painters of his day and appears to have lived his entire life in Blois. His brother Jacques was an engraver who produced a series of designs for watch cases, examples of his engravings may be found in both the Victoria & Albert Museum and the British Museum. For a similarly decorated watch with painted scenes attributed to Vauquer, see: Sotheby's Geneva, 13 November 2007, lot 86. Further examples of work attributed to Robert Vauquer may be found at the Patek Philippe Museum, Geneva.

Jean Bonbruict was a master from 1632, juré in 1649 and died in 1678. He took Simon Durand as an apprentice in 1632. Bombruict is mentioned in E. Develle, Les Horlogers Blésois, Blois 1917, pp.385-386 also in Thibaud Fourrier, Dictionnaire des Horlogers De Blois, Vol.111, p.11 and by Tardy, in Dictionnaire des Horlogers Français, 1971, Vol.I, p.65. The maker's name is variously spelt Bonbruict of Bombruict.