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Thomas Mudge, inventor of the lever escapement. The lever escapement, invented by Thomas Mudge in 1754 [18] and improved by Josiah Emery in 1785, gradually came into use from about 1800 onwards, chiefly in Britain; it was also adopted by Abraham-Louis Breguet, but Swiss watchmakers (who by now were the chief suppliers of watches to most of Europe) mostly adhered to the cylinder until the 1860s.
The first self-winding mechanism was invented for pocket watches in 1770 by Abraham-Louis Perrelet, [62] but the first "self-winding", or "automatic", wristwatch was the invention of a British watch repairer named John Harwood in 1923. This type of watch winds itself without requiring any special action by the wearer.
The Watch 1505 / ˌ w ɒ t ʃ f ɪ f ˈ t iː n ˈ ə ʊ ˈ f ɑː ɪ v / (also named PHN1505 or Pomander Watch of 1505) is the world's first watch. It was crafted by the German inventor, locksmith and watchmaker Peter Henlein from Nuremberg , during the year 1505, in the early German Renaissance period, as part of the Northern Renaissance .
Inscription: ‘IN MEMORY OF THE INVENTOR OF THE POCKET WATCH PETER HENLEIN FROM THE CITY OF NUREMBERG AND THE GERMAN WATCHMAKERS ASSOCIATION’. [28] [29] His fame as the inventor of the watch came after his rise to popular consciousness in the 19th century, through a novel by Karl Spindler, Der Nürnberger Sophokles. [2]
Peter Henlein (c. 1479–1542), German locksmith, Nürnberg, often considered the inventor of the watch, portable clocks and watches. Nicolaus Kratzer (1487–late 1550), German mathematician and astronomer, Munich , royal astronomer of Henry VIII of England , sun dial .
Watches were worn during the Franco-Prussian War (1870–1871), and by the time of the Boer War (1899–1902), watches had been recognised as a valuable tool. [184] Early models were essentially standard pocket watches fitted to a leather strap, but, by the early 20th century, manufacturers began producing purpose-built wristwatches.
Watches often had garnet, quartz, or even glass jewels; only top quality watches used sapphire or ruby. [13] In 1902, a process to grow artificial sapphire crystals was invented, making jewels much cheaper. Jewels in modern watches are all synthetic sapphire or (usually) ruby, made of corundum (Al 2 O 3), one of the
Invented by Adrien Philippe in 1842 and commercialized by Patek Philippe & Co. in the 1850s, the stem-wind, stem-set movement did away with the watch key which was a necessity for the operation of any pocket watch up to that point.