Oignon Alarm Michel Girard

Oignon Alarm Michel Girard. Made circa 1700. Very fine and very rare, Louis XIV, repousse silver and gilt brass oignon watch with single hand and alarm. Two-body, “oignon”, the repousse silver back decorated with a scene of Mars seated wearing breastplate and helmet and holding a spear and shield, scroll border, pierced foliate sound frets intersected with repousse military trophies and townscapes, pierced foliate and strapwork band beneath the bezel, the silver mounted bezel decorated with pierced foliate panels and repousse fruit swags. Engraved gilt brass with radial blue Roman numerals on white enamel cartouches, inner white enamel quarter-hour ring, inner alarm setting disc with engraved Arabic numerals and mounted with the hour hand, winding aperture between 3 and 4. Blued steel beetle hand for the hours and poker hand for the alarm setting. 46 mm, frosted gilt full plate, divided Egyptian pillars, fusee and chain, click and pawl set-up, verge escapement, three-arm steel balance, pierced and chased cock decorated with symmetrical foliage and strapwork, Tompion-type regulator with silver scale disc, alarm train with engraved gilt standing barrel, steel train and sounding with a single hammer on a bell in the back of the case. Movement signed. Diam. 59 mm. Notes Literature: La Montre Française, Adolphe Chapiro, Les Editions de l’Amateur, 1991, pp. 68, 69 & 70, fig 148 - 153.