This is the story of one of the complications that made me a watch enthusiast. Watches nowadays are more than a timepiece, they’re a piece of history, encapsulating centuries of know-how and a representation of your personality on your wrist. Répétition minutes is an example of this, a complication many perceive as ‘luxurious’ but that in reality was conceived as a tool.
For those of us that might do not know what it is, the répétition minutes is the equivalent of having a church bell in your watch, it is a mechanism made from over 100 components, synchronised with the mechanism indicating time. The second mechanism is activated by a pusher or a lever and in doing so will activate two hammers that each strike one of two different bells, with different sonorities. One bell will indicate the hour of the day through the “dong” while the “ding” indicates the minutes.
But how was it a tool? This creation takes its roots back to the 17th century England, and as with many ancient mechanisms in horology its true origins are shrouded in obscurity. This invention was developed at a time without electricity and people had no way of knowing the time in the dark – watches would be useless if light was scarce, not to mention the issue of blind people being able to tell the time. So, watchmakers started working towards a mechanism that could produce sound to tell the time, and developed the répétition minutes. The mechanism was not only useful in the dark, however, it was also used in court as a reminder of the time – to keep schedule.
Edward Barlow is accredited with inventing a clock with a bell in 1676, a mechanism that did not match the modern répétition minutes. In 1680, Daniel Quare invented what is considered to be equivalent to the modern répétition minutes mechanism and having discovered that Barlow was applying for a patent around the same time, disputed this patent with the backing of the Clockmaker’s Company and convinced the King James II to support his watch’s patent over Barlow’s in 1687. Ultimately, Quare’s mechanism was more efficient, having one pusher instead of two, and as such, he is widely regarded as the inventor today.
Breguet Répétition Minutes ref. 7637 / Credit: Breguet
Later, Abraham-Louis Breguet pioneered the development, improvement, and miniaturisation of this very complex mechanism; replacing the bells with a system of ‘chimes’ that would be wound in the case, reducing its volume and adding different ‘ring tones’, if you will. In fact, 1783 Breguet created the first répétition minutes operated by a gong rather than a bell.
The répétition minutes is undoubtedly an important revelation in horology, despite what naysayers shout from the balconies. What makes it so unique is not only its usefulness and the pleasure it gives its owners; one singularity of the répétition minutes is that the sound they make is completely unique. Two watches from the same company and model, with the mechanism crafted from the same bloc, with the same process, will emit different sounds. Giving each watch a unique and un-replicable signature.
By: Simon Pontroue