Highlights of Sotheby’s Important Watch Auction of May 2016

For our final coverage of the main highlights presented by the 3 main auction houses, we will now focus on the talking pieces presented by Sotheby’s with Pedro Reiser, Deputy Director of the Watches Department. There are naturally many wrist watches and few interesting pocket watches featured in this auction, but we will start with an amazing bird cage from 1825 with a musical automaton realised by Bautte & Moynier. And we follow with the ancestor of the chronograph as Sotheby’s is putting a very rare example of the Nicolas Mathieu Rieussec up for auction. Though today there is a little rivalry and serious discussions as to whom was the inventor of the chronograph, this example of the inking chronograph was used to time horse races in the mid 1820’s.