Thomas Lister Luddenden. A George II oak musical longcase clock, the case with raised panel to the plinth on apron skirting, rectangular trunk door with shaped top and brass escutcheon, 1/4-columns to the angles, the hood with detached gilt-wood columns supporting the caddy top with simple pierced wood sound fret, the 12in. dial signed Thos. Lister Luddenden on the silvered chapter ring with pierced brass hands and subsidiary blued steel hand, the foliate engraved gilt centre with cut-out for the painted moonphase above and smaller arched aperture for calendar, unusual lion-and-unicorn spandrels, the three train 30-hour movement with four ringed pillars, anchor escapement, interlinked countwheels for hour strike on bell and music every four hours on six bells

Details

Thomas Lister Luddenden. A George II oak musical longcase clock, the case with raised panel to the plinth on apron skirting, rectangular trunk door with shaped top and brass escutcheon, 1/4-columns to the angles, the hood with detached gilt-wood columns supporting the caddy top with simple pierced wood sound fret, the 12in. dial signed Thos. Lister Luddenden on the silvered chapter ring with pierced brass hands and subsidiary blued steel hand, the foliate engraved gilt centre with cut-out for the painted moonphase above and smaller arched aperture for calendar, unusual lion-and-unicorn spandrels, the three train 30-hour movement with four ringed pillars, anchor escapement, interlinked countwheels for hour strike on bell and music every four hours on six bells
7ft.6in. (230cm.) high

Provenance

Sotheby's, London, 13/12/88, lot 62

Literature

B. Loomes, Grandfather clocks and their cases, 1985, pp. 310-312

Lot Essay

Thomas Lister, the elder, 1718-79, apprenticed to John Stancliffe of Barkisland. He waqs working in Luddenden by 1741 and later joined his highly accomplished son in Halifax. A noted and respected clockmaker his movements were not usually as technical or complicated as his sons examples. The present clock perports to play the hymn 'York'. The incongruous blued hand in the dial may have been part of the silencing mechanism

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