Rarely has so much been written about a timepiece as for Breguet’s Marie-Antoinette watch. Let us travel back in time to eighteenth-century Versailles and the court of Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette. The queen, known for her love of jewellery, would often seek refuge in her private domain, the Petit Trianon, as well as in the arms of her different lovers. One of them, a Swedish officer of the queen’s guard named by historians as Count Axel de Fersen, is said to have commissioned a watch from Breguet as a gift for his queen.
Carte blanche
The Neuchâtel watchmaker was no stranger to Louis XVI’s court. Fascinated by objects of value, Marie-Antoinette already owned one of Breguet’s perpétuelles, a watch with a self-winding rotor mechanism, invented by Breguet himself. Clearly enamoured, the queen’s suitor contacted the watchmaker in 1783 with an unexpected proposal: to make the most spectacular watch ever seen.
With no limitation of time or expense, Breguet had free rein to create a watch that must leave Marie-Antoinette speechless with admiration. The queen knew nothing of this extraordinary gift. Nor did she live to admire it. When she mounted the scaffold in 1793, the watch was still at Breguet’s Parisian workshop. It was not finished until 1827.
A work of art
It took a full forty-four years to complete the watch, proof indeed that it is a work of art. This stunning piece features the greatest watchmaking complications known at that time. One of Breguet’s perpétuelles, the Marie-Antoinette watch includes a minute-repeater, a full perpetual calendar, an equation of time (that is, the difference each day between solar time and mean time indicated by clocks and watches), a power-reserve indicator, a bimetallic thermometer, a large independent seconds hand and a small centre seconds hand, a lever escapement, a gold balance spring and a parachute anti-shock device. This profusion of technological wonders were housed inside a gold case with a rock crystal dial through which the movement could be admired.
From HH Magazine
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