Paired mantel clock and companion pocket watch, with a mechanism to synchronise and rewind the watch · France
Breguet Pendule Sympathique (clock-and-watch pair)
Partially verifiedBreguet devised a system in which a specially made pocket watch is placed into a cradle atop a companion mantel clock overnight; the clock mechanism engages the watch to correct its time to match the clock and, in some versions, to wind it, a highly sophisticated mechanical solution to the everyday problem of keeping a portable watch accurately set.
Technical facts
- Mechanism
- Mechanical coupling engaging the watch's setting (and in some versions winding) works when seated in the clock's cradle
- Typical complication
- Clock often incorporates its own additional complications (e.g. perpetual calendar or equation of time) independent of the paired watch
Historical significance
- Breguet devised a system in which a specially made pocket watch is placed into a cradle atop a companion mantel clock overnight; the clock mechanism engages the watch to correct its time to match the clock and, in some versions, to wind it, a highly sophisticated mechanical solution to the everyday problem of keeping a portable watch accurately set.
- Very few examples were made in Breguet's lifetime and each surviving pairing (clock plus its specific matched watch) needs individual provenance verification, since watch and clock were built as a matched pair and are only meaningful as documented sets, not as generic 'Breguet Sympathique' types.
Related photographs
No confidently matched photograph of this subject has been found yet. These photographs show a closely related record, and are not examples of the type described on this page.
Sources & references
- Daniels, G., The Art of Breguet
- Musée des Arts et Métiers, published collection materials on Breguet's work
Where sources disagree, the disagreement is stated rather than resolved silently.