357

Swiss

A rare pink gold hunter case quarter repeating pocket watch with jaquemarts

HK$44,000–64,000
Swiss
Circa 1880
26'936
26'936
18k pink gold
Mechanical, 45 jewels
56 mm. diameter
<em>Case and cuvette numbered, cuvette signed</em>
With fitted presentation box.
The present watch is accompanied with an extremely interesting back story. When admiring the watch, the first feature one notices is that it is signed Pateck & Ci. In Patek Philippe Watches by Martin Huber and Alan Banbery, the authors discuss an event on the 9th of July 1885, where Jean Adrien Philippe discovered a watch signed Pateck & Ci at the Antwerp World Exhibition. Patek Philippe & Co. subsequently registered a law suit, which lasted many years and resulted in a verdict on the 18th of November 1890 that the firm A. Schwob & Frère was to pay Patek Philippe & Co. a compensation of 15,000 Swiss Francs, which is the sum equaling the profit made from selling the watches falsely signed in this way.