Gold & enamel Watch no. 335

Case: Dial: Movement: Provenance: 18?? - Capt, Geneve 2007 - Christies, 14 May 2007, est CHF70-100,000, sold CHF222,000, " Capt. A very fine and rare 18K gold double dial two-train musical automaton watch Signed Henry Capt a Geneve, no. 335, circa 1815 With keywound gilt-finished cylinder movement, chain fusee, musical pin barrel, the engine-turned gilt dial with Breguet numerals on blank chapter ring surrounded by two light blue enamel rings, blued steel moon-style hands, the glazed back with a painted polychrome enamel scene depicting a classical landscape, surmounted by a vari-coloured gold automaton scene depicting a peasant seated under a tree, playing a mandolin and tapping his foot while a lady is coming out of the house, holding a wreath of flowers is dancing back and forth, a grazing sheep moving its head up and down to the left, all in unison with the music and activated by depressing a button in the pendant, movement band signed, numbered underneath the dial 57 mm. diam. Provenance Collection Leon Leroy Leon Leroy (1876-1961) was a direct descendant of the famous French watchmaking dynasty of the Leroy family founded in 1785 by Charles Bazile Leroy. The business was taken over by Leon Leroy in 1935 after the death of Louis Leroy and was directed by him until his death in 1961 when he was succeeded by his brothers Pierre and Philippe. Leon Leroy devoted a large part of his time to collecting books on the history of French horology. His collection, containing numerous items of greatest rarity, was offered at public auction in Paris in 1982. Literature Illustrated in Les Automates by Alfred Chapuis, Edmond Droz, p. 186, pl. 206. "