Edward Bridgman

• gilt full plate movement, verge escapement, screwed-on pierced and decoratively floral engraved balance cock, flat steel balance, fusee and chain, worm and wheel set-up, tulip pillars • silvered champlevé dial, large Roman numerals, inner quarter hour divisions, the centre with engraved floral motif, single blued steel hour hand • plain silver inner case, the back with shuttered winding aperture • outer protective case with fish skin covering and finely decorated with piqué work • movement signed Edwardus Bridgman, Londini 

Sotheby's London, 9th November, 1999, lot 20

Terence Camerer Cuss, The English Watch 1585-1970, p. 94, pl. 45

 

The design of this watch appeared around 1670, although it is possible that the present watch dates to a little later in that decade. Bridgman emphasized clarity in this piece by placing the large Roman numerals at the edge of the dial whilst still allowing for a substantial ring calibrated for the quarter hours. Watches with four wheel trains (which allowed for power reserves in excess of 24-hours) were becoming increasingly prevalent from the late 1660s and the dial design of the present watch was one popularly used on such watches. These eye catching dials would certainly have marked out their owners as being in touch with the latest fashions and the emphasis placed on their quarter hour divisions would have suggested to the viewer, rightly or wrongly, that the watch was a more accurate timekeeper. These dials were also often fitted with a key-set hand, which helped to avoid damage to the dial's surface that might otherwise be caused by fumbling fingers moving the body of the hand itself. See Camerer Cuss, The English Watch 1585-1970, p. 94.

Edward Bridgeman was apprenticed in 1655 to John Matchett of Russell St., Covent Garden. Bridgman was made a Freeman of the Clockmakers' Company in 1662.