Salomon Chesnon, Blois

AN INTERESTING AND UNUSUAL SILVER PAIR CASED WATCH WITH CENTRAL ROTATING ARMORIAL DISC MARKING THE HOUR CIRCA 1635

• Movement: gilded full plate, verge escapement, later flat four-arm balance, balance cock decoratively pierced and engraved with scrolling foliage, long foot, worm and wheel set-up lacking indication plate, fusee and gut line, vase-shaped pillars, signed Salomon Chesnon, à Blois
• Dial: silver chapter ring with Roman numerals, half hour divisions between, central rotating disc engraved with the arms of the Paget family the tip of the armorial shield indicating the time, raised touch pin to the central disc for adjusting the time, gilded outer border
• Cases: silver inner, the back engraved with scene possibly depicting Meleager and Atalanta, the shutter for the winding aperture incorporated into the engraving of the scene, decoratively engraved floral border, the band further engraved with hunting scenes depicting figures on horseback, hunting dogs chasing a deer and a dog and huntsman trapping a wild boar, bezel split for glass retention and engraved with flowers • outer case with elaborately engraved monogram to the centre, the border with five further roundels with stylised monograms interspersed by engraved flowers, the front bezel similarly engraved with flowers
diameter of outer case 39mm, inner 34mm

Provenance:
The arms to the dial are those of the Paget family. William Paget, 5th Baron Paget (1609-1678) was born at Beaudesert House in Staffordshire. During the English civil war he served as a Parliamentarian but switched sides in 1642 to become a Royalist under King Charles I. In the 18th Century the family were created Earls of Uxbridge and, in the 19th century, the Maquesses of Anglesey. The monograms to the outer case suggest that the watch may have been a marriage gift.

Salomon Chesnon's father (also named Salomon) was born in Blois in 1572 and died in 1639. In 1618, Marie de Medici bought a chiming table clock from Salmon Chesnon the elder for 800 livres. Salomon the younger (1607-1683) was also born in Blois and was apprenticed in 1625, he took over his father's business upon the latter's death in 1639 (see Tardy, Dictionnaire des Horlogers Français, vol.1, 1971, p.127).