Clocks and Watches

***COURTESY OF TWOBEARS BOOKS*** One of man's earliest scientific achievements was the measurement of time by an instrument - from the shadow of a tall palm tree or stone obelisk timekeeping has evolved through sundials, water clocks, sand glasses and fire clocks to the quartz and atomic clocks which make space travel possible today. Carriage, grandfather, shelf, bracket - these are some of the clocks described. Watches, which evolved from table clocks and were first worn around the neck, are discussed and many fine, elaborate, jewelled examples are illustrated. The author, Eric Bruton, has traced the eventful history of this progress, and discusses many interesting side developments: that clocks and watches were the first technical products to be traded by Europe with the East; that the mastery of timekeeping at sea in the 18th and 19th centuries brought accurate navigation and the charting of the world's coastlines. There is a chapter devoted to clocks and watches in North America. Certain early American clockmakers gained great eminence, and the finest development of the shelf clock was a purely American design. The continual striving after accuracy has taxed the clockmakers' ingenuity through the centuries, as is clearly shown in the drawing of escapements from the 13th to 19th century. CLOCKS AND WATCHES is liberally illustrated with over two hundred pictures, many in full colour. They portray clocks and watches both weird and wonderful, including an uncommon one of Bilston Boxes - many of which were sham watches of varying degrees of realism.