James Stratton
Director
Lot 77
A very rare late 17th century ebonised quarter repeating table timepiece Richard Greenhill, Canterbury
2 December 2025, 14:00 GMT
London, New Bond Street£4,000 - £6,000
Ask about this lot
Lewis Walduck
Cataloguer
A very rare late 17th century ebonised quarter repeating table timepiece
Richard Greenhill, Canterbury
The shallow caddy top surmounted by a knopped brass handle and overhanging cornice over glazed rectangular side panels to a moulded base on brass squat bun feet. The 6.5-inch square brass dial with winged cherubs head spandrels framing the silvered Roman and Arabic chapter ring with cruciform half-hour markers and blued steel hands, the finely engraved centre decorated with two pairs of flowers within scrolls over the lambrequin drapery signature cartouche signed Rich Greenhill Canterbury fecit, with a date aperture at XII. The movement secured by five latched and knopped pillars, with knife-edge verge escapement and short bob pendulum. Driven by a single gut fusee (re-strung in steel), with independent quarter repeating on a pair of bells, the hour bell screwed into the top pillar, the quarter bell mounted on the backplate via a steel heart-shaped foot. The backplate plain. Ticking and repeating. 36cms (14.25ins) high.
The shallow caddy top surmounted by a knopped brass handle and overhanging cornice over glazed rectangular side panels to a moulded base on brass squat bun feet. The 6.5-inch square brass dial with winged cherubs head spandrels framing the silvered Roman and Arabic chapter ring with cruciform half-hour markers and blued steel hands, the finely engraved centre decorated with two pairs of flowers within scrolls over the lambrequin drapery signature cartouche signed Rich Greenhill Canterbury fecit, with a date aperture at XII. The movement secured by five latched and knopped pillars, with knife-edge verge escapement and short bob pendulum. Driven by a single gut fusee (re-strung in steel), with independent quarter repeating on a pair of bells, the hour bell screwed into the top pillar, the quarter bell mounted on the backplate via a steel heart-shaped foot. The backplate plain. Ticking and repeating. 36cms (14.25ins) high.
Footnotes
The Greenhills were a prominent family of clockmakers and blacksmiths, established in Stockbury near Maidstone in Kent by the early 17th century. By the mid-1600s, the family had divided into two successful branches based in Maidstone and Ashford/Canterbury. John Greenhill III (1655–1702) of Maidstone became a prosperous landowner and was elected Mayor in 1702, while Richard Greenhill I (1616–1687/8) moved to Ashford, where his sons John and Richard II continued the clockmaking trade. Richard Greenhill II later settled in Canterbury, gaining the Freedom of the city in 1676 and running one of its busiest workshops, taking at least six apprentices. His estate was valued at £1,543 at his death in 1705—surviving domestic clocks by him are exceptionally rare, suggesting that much of his work focused on turret clocks.
A striking clock by Richard Greenhill with a similar dial was sold at Christie's London, Important Clocks 11 July 2003 lot 81.