A paper on this subject was read by Professor Hamberger, in the year
1758, before the Society of Göttingen; but as the publication of the
Transactions of the Society was interrupted, it was never printed. I
however procured the manuscript from the professor’s son, Secretary
Hamberger, at Gotha, and I here insert it, corrected in a few places,
where necessary, but without any other alteration[1040].
“Weidler[1041] and Chambers[1042] are, doubtless, both mistaken when
they place the invention of automatous clocks about the end of the
fifteenth or beginning of the sixteenth century. The latter says, ‘It
is certain that the art of constructing clocks, such as those now
in use, was first invented or at least revived in Germany about two
hundred years ago.’ The same account is given by Weidler, whom Chambers
perhaps copied. But, however flattering this opinion may be to the
ingenuity of the Germans, it is so apparently false in regard to the
time, that one cannot assent to it; nor is it even probable in regard
to the country, though it must be allowed that the art of clockmaking
flourished very much in Germany, particularly at Nuremberg, about the
beginning of the sixteenth century.
“As these two authors make the invention of clocks too modern, others,
on the contrary, carry it back to a period too early. Without entering
into any dissertation on the machines of Archimedes and Posidonius,
which are said to have measured the hours of the day, I shall only
observe that a certain writer pretends to have found mention made of
a clock in the third century[1043]. In support of this assertion he
refers to the Acts of St. Sebastian, the martyr, where Chromatius,
the governor of Rome, says, when about to be cured by him, ‘I have a
glass chamber in which the whole learning and science of the stars is
constructed mechanically, in making which my father Tarquinius is known
to have expended more than two hundred pounds of gold.’ St. Sebastian
answers, ‘If you have made your choice to keep this whole, you destroy
yourself.’ To which Chromatius replies, ‘How so? do we employ any
sacrificial rights in the construction of an almanac or ephemeris,
when merely the courses of the months and years are distinguished
numerically for every hour; and the full and new moon is, by means of
certain calculations, foreshown by a motion of the fingers[1044].’
This valuable machine, however, can hardly be called a clock; for if
it had been an automaton, it would not have required to be moved with
the fingers in order to show the time of full moon. If I understand the
author’s words properly, it was not calculated to point out the hours;
but to exhibit the sun’s course through the twelve signs of the zodiac,
the motion of the rest of the planets, and their relative situation in
every month, or at any period of the year. That the signs of the zodiac
and the planets were represented on the machine, appears from what
follows. St. Polycarp (the companion of St. Stephen) said, ‘There are
the signs of the Lion, of Capricorn, Sagittarius, Scorpio and the Bull;
in Aries the moon, in the Crab an hour, in Jupiter a star, in Mercury
the tropics, in Venus Mars, and in all those monstrous demons is seen
an art hostile to God[1045].’ But whatever this machine might have
been, it was of no use to others, or to posterity: it was broken to
pieces by these saints, so that, even allowing it to have been a clock,
the knowledge of it must have been then lost.
“We find also, that Bernardus Saccus[1046] ascribes the invention
of clocks to Boëthius, in the fifth century; but Bernardus seems to
have forgotten what he quoted a little before from Cassiodorus[1047],
respecting the clock of Boëthius, that it determined the hours _guttis
aquarum_. It must, therefore, have been a water-clock, and not a clock
moved by wheels and weights. The same Cassiodorus had provided his
monks at the monastery of St. Andiol[1048], in Languedoc, with machines
of the like kind: ‘I am known,’ says he, ‘to have constructed for you a
time-piece which the light of the sun indexes; moreover another acting
by water which marks the hours both day and night; as frequently upon
some days there is no sunshine[1049].’ We are to understand also, as
alluding to such clocks, what is said by the writer of the life of St.
Leobin, bishop of Chartrain, about the year 556[1050], when he tells
us, that to him (St. Leobin) was committed the duty of regulating the
course of the hours and the vigils.
“I come now to the seventh century. In Du Cange’s Glossary we find the
word _Index_, which is explained to be the index or hand of a clock,
or the small bell which announces the hours by its sound; and this
opinion is adopted by Muratori[1051]. Du Cange quotes in support of
his assertion a monkish work called _Regula Magistri_, the author of
which is not certainly known[1052], but which Mabillon[1053] asserts
to have been written before the year 700. The passages to which he
refers are, ‘Cum advenisse divinam horam percussus in oratorio index
_monstraverit_.’ (When the index being struck in the oratory shall
have shown that the hour for prayer had come.) ‘Cum _sonuerit index_;’
and ‘Cum ad opus divinum oratorii _index sonaverit_[1054].’ But Du
Cange might have perceived, had he quoted the whole passage from the
fifty-fifth chapter, that allusion is not here made to a clock; for it
is said, not merely ‘cum sonuerit index,’ but ‘cum sonuerit index ab
Abbate percussus.’ (When the index struck by the Abbot shall sound).
It was a _scilla_ or _skella_, perhaps only a board; and Martene[1055]
seems to understand the word _index_ in the true sense when he explains
it the signal by which the brethren were called to divine service.
“That machine which was sent as a present to Charlemagne by the king
of Persia, in the year 807, is supposed also to have been a clock like
those used at present; and if we follow the Chronicon Turonense, one
may easily fall into the same opinion: ‘The king of the Persians sent
a time-piece in which the twelve hours were marked by the performance
of a cymbal and of certain horsemen who at each hour went out through
the windows, and on their return in the last hour of the day shut the
windows as they marched back[1056].’ The description of it however,
to be found in Annales Francorum, ascribed to Eginhard, shows clearly
that it was far different from our clocks. The author says, ‘Likewise
a time-piece wonderfully constructed of brass with mechanical art, in
which the course of the twelve hours was turned towards a clepsydra,
with as many brass balls which fell down at the completion of the
hour, and by their fall sounded a bell placed under them[1057].’ It
was evidently therefore a water-clock, furnished with some ingenious
mechanism, but having nothing in common with our clocks.
“About the same period lived Pacificus, archdeacon of Verona, who is
celebrated for having invented a clock[1058]. His epitaph, besides
relating other services which he did, says,--
Horologium nocturnum nullus ante viderat.
En invenit argumentum et primus fundaverat;
Horologioque carmen spheræ cœli optimum,
Plura alia graviaque prudens invenit.
Scipio Maffei endeavours to prove, that we are here to understand a
clock moved by wheels and weights; but, in my opinion, his arguments
are extremely weak. ‘This _horologium_,’ says he, ‘the like of which
had been never seen, and which was different from a sun-dial, because
it showed the hours in the night-time, could not be a clepsydra or
water-clock, for clocks of that kind were not only known to the
ancients, but even to the inhabitants of Italy in latter times, so
that it could have been nothing but a clock like ours.’ But even if we
allow, with this learned man, that water-clocks were known in Italy
at that period, it cannot be denied that they were scarce, and used
only by few, as may be evidently gathered from what is said of these
machines by Cassiodorus. The greater part of the people might have
been unacquainted with them at the above-mentioned time; and there
is no necessity for adhering so closely to the words of the epitaph,
‘nullus ante viderat,’ as Maffei has done. Besides, Maffei himself
destroys the foundation on which he rests his opinion; for he relates
that a _horologium nocturnum_ was sent to Pepin, king of France, by
pope Stephen II. This appears from the pope’s own letter; but Maffei
is under a mistake respecting the name, for it was Paul, and not
Stephen. The letter, which may be found in the Codex Carolinus[1059],
is dated in the year 756. Maffei thinks that this machine was of a
construction different from that of a water-clock; but if it pointed
out the hours in the day-time, as well as in the night, according to
his supposition, there is no reason, as Muratori observes, why it
should have been called _horologium nocturnum_. In my opinion, we ought
here to understand a clepsydra, or water-clock, such as that used
by Cassiodorus for the like purpose, and which Hildemar recommended
in the ninth century to the monks, who were obliged to observe the
hours. Hildemar says, ‘He who wishes to do this properly, must have
_horologium aquæ_[1060].’
“That these water-clocks however were then scarce, as well as in the
following centuries, we have reason to conclude from their being so
little spoken of in the writings of those periods. In the ancient
customs of the monastery of St. Viton, at Werden[1061], written as is
said in the tenth century, no mention of them occurs; and the monks
regulated their prayers by the crowing of the cock; for it is said,
‘Cum lucem ales nunciaverit, dabuntur omnia signa in resurrectione
Domini nostri,’ &c. I find as little mention of them in the eleventh
century, even in passages where they could not have been omitted, had
they been known. Thus, in a little work by Pet. Damiani, De Perfectione
Monachorum, where the author speaks of the _significator horarum_,
he does not so much as allude to a clepsydra. That the reader may
know what he means by _significator horarum_, I shall here quote his
own words: ‘He could not find time for idle fables, nor hold long
conversations, nor finally could he trouble himself about what was done
by the laity, but always intent on the duties of his office, always
provident, always anxious, he felt a desire to construct a voluble
sphere that should never stop, should show the passage of the stars and
the flight of time. He also had a custom of singing to himself whenever
he wished to have a notion as to the quantity of time; that, whenever
the brightness of the sun or the position of the stars was obscured by
the weather he might form a certain time-measurer by the quantity of
psalmody he had accomplished[1062].’
“Some ascribe the invention of our modern clocks to Gerbert, who,
in the tenth century, was raised to the pontifical chair at Rome,
under the name of Sylvester II., and who was reckoned to be the first
mathematician and astronomer of his time[1063]. This opinion however
is supported only by mere conjecture, and appears to be false from
the account of Dithmar, who says, ‘Gerbert, on being expelled from
his country, sought the emperor Otho, and after a long conversation
with him, made the time-piece in Magdeburg, constructing it correctly
by taking as guide the polar star[1064].’ No mention is made here of
wheels or weights, and this horologium seems to have been a sun-dial,
which Gerbert fixed up by observing the polar star. It appears, indeed,
that Gerbert was acquainted with no other kind of _horologia_; for
those who speak of his book De Astrolabio, in which he explains the
method of constructing dials for various latitudes, produce no further
proofs[1065]. Some, according to the testimony of Kircher, consider
this horologium to have been a portable dial, which showed the hour
when properly set by the help of a needle touched with a magnet; but
even this opinion is not warranted by the words of Dithmar.
“The anonymous author of the Life of William, abbot of Hirshau[1066],
who lived in the eleventh century, and who was a very learned man for
his time, says, ‘Naturale horologium ad exemplum cælestis hæmispherii
excogitasse.’ Though this passage is so short, that no idea can be
formed from it of the construction of the machine, it is evident that
it alludes neither to a sun-dial nor to a water-clock, but to some
piece of mechanism which pointed out the hours and exhibited the motion
of the earth and other planets. As more frequent mention of _horologia_
occurs afterwards, and as, in speaking of them, expressions are used
which cannot be applied to sun-dials or water-clocks, I am induced to
think that the invention of our clocks belongs to this period. In the
Constitutiones Hirsaugienses, or Gengebacenses, of the same William,
it is said of the sacristan, ‘eum horologium dirigere et ordinare.’
In the like manner Bernardus Monachus, a writer of the same century,
says, in the Ordo Cluniacensis, ‘apocrisiarium horologium dirigere
et diligentius temperare.’ The same author, in the Ancient Customs,
&c. of the Monastery of St. Victor, at Paris, written also about the
same time, says that the registrar (_matricularius_), the sacrist’s
companion, ought ‘horas canonicas nocte et die ad divinum celebrandum
custodire, signa pulsare, _horologium temperare_.’
“The unequal hours then in use rendered this regulating of the
_horologia_ necessary. The days and the nights consisted of twelve
hours each; but were sometimes shorter and sometimes longer. The
reason of this is explained in the sixty-fourth chapter of the
before-mentioned Customs, where it is said, ‘From the solstice of
summer to the solstice of winter, the time-piece is regulated thus:
as much as that space of night which precedes the matins gradually
increases according to the increments of the nights through the several
months, it, slowly increasing, makes that space in the winter solstice
which is before matins to that which follows, twice. On the contrary,
from the winter solstice to that of spring it is thus regulated: it
decreases that space which it had got in advance according to the
decrease of the nights through the several months, until scarcely
decreasing, it at length in the summer solstice passes over in the same
time that space which is before matins and that which follows[1067].’
Such was the regulating of the _horologia_, and I much doubt whether it
could be applied to water-clocks.
“These _horologia_ not only pointed out the hours by an index, but
emitted also a sound. This we learn from Primaria Instituta Canonicorum
Præmonstratensium[1068], where it is ordered that the sacristan should
regulate the _horologium_ and make it sound before matins to awaken
him. I dare not however venture thence to infer, that these machines
announced the number of the hour by their sound, as they seem only to
have given an alarm at the time of getting up from bed. I have indeed
never yet found a passage where it is mentioned that the number of
the hour was expressed by them; and when we read of their emitting a
sound, we are to understand that it was for the purpose of wakening
the sacristan to morning-prayers. The expression ‘horologium cecidit,’
which occurs frequently in the before-quoted writers, I consider as
allusive to this sounding of the machine. Du Cange, in my opinion,
under the word _horologium_, conceives wrongly the expression ‘de
ponderibus in imum delapsis,’ because the machine was then at rest, and
could rouse neither the sacristan nor any one else whose business it
was to beat the _scilla_.
“I shall now produce other testimony which will serve further to
confirm what I have here said of the origin of clocks. Calmet, in
his Commentary on the Regulæ S. Benedicti, quotes from a book on the
usages of the Cistercians, three passages which I shall give as he has
translated them, because I have not access at present to the original.
‘We read,’ says he, ‘in chap. 21 of the first part of their Customs,
compiled about the year 1120, that the bells will not be sounded for
any service, not even for the clock, from the mass of Holy Thursday, to
that of Holy Saturday; and in chap. 114, the sacristan is ordered to
regulate the clock that it may strike and wake him during winter before
matins or before the nocturns; and in chaps. 68 and 114, that when the
brethren have risen too early the sacristan give notice to him who
reads the last lesson to continue it until the clock strikes, or till
signal be made to the reader to leave off[1069].’
“The use of these machines must have been continued from that period,
for we find them mentioned in the thirteenth century, in the commentary
of Bernardus Cassinensis (Bernard of Cassino) on the unpublished Regulæ
S. Benedicti, from the eighth chapter of which Martene gives the
following quotation: ‘But the eighth hour being already come, there
was sufficient interval,--from the middle of the night, when he who
had care of the clock rose to strike it and to light the lamps of the
church which might have gone out on account of the length of the night,
and to ring the bells in order to wake the sleeping brothers,--that he
was able to get through half the eighth hour before the brothers had
risen[1070].’ It is said also in the Chronicon Mellicense, in Du Cange,
‘Some one, deputed by the superior who had the care of the _striking
clock_, struck; and also carried light to all the cells[1071].’
“As all arts are at first imperfect, it is observed of these clocks
that they sometimes deceived; and hence, in the Ordo Cluniacensis
Bernardi Mon., the person who regulated the clock is ordered, in case
it should go wrong, ‘ut notet in cereo, et in cursu stellarum vel
etiam lunæ, ut fratres surgere faciat ad horam competentem.’ The same
admonition is given in the Constitutiones Hirsaugienses.
“From what has been said I think it is sufficiently apparent that
clocks moved by wheels and weights began certainly to be used in the
monasteries in Europe, about the eleventh century. I do not, however,
think that Europe is entitled to the honour of this invention; but that
it is rather to be ascribed to the Saracens, to whom we are indebted
for most of the mathematical sciences. This conjecture is supported by
the _horologium_, which, as Trithemius tells us, was sent by the sultan
of Egypt, in the year 1232, to the emperor Frederic II. ‘In the same
year,’ says he, ‘the Saladin of Egypt sent by his ambassadors as a gift
to the emperor Frederic a valuable machine of wonderful construction
worth more than five thousand ducats. For it appeared to resemble
internally a celestial globe in which figures of the sun, moon, and
other planets formed with the greatest skill moved, being impelled by
weights and wheels, so that performing their course in certain and
fixed intervals they pointed out the hour night and day with infallible
certainty; also the twelve signs of the zodiac with certain appropriate
characters, moved with the firmament, contained within themselves the
course of the planets[1072].’
“The writers of this century speak in such a manner of clocks that it
appears they must, at that period, have been well-known. Gulielmus
Alvernus, disputing against those who deny the existence of the soul,
after producing various arguments, thus obviates one which might be
used against him. ‘Neither,’ says he, ‘do the motions of those clocks
which are moved by water or weights give you uneasiness, both kinds of
which move but for a short and moderate time, require frequent repair,
the arranging of their parts, and the perfect skill of the astronomer
who has a thorough knowledge of his art. But in the bodies of animals
and vegetables the motive power is entirely internal, which moderates
and regulates the movements of their parts and renders it in all ways
perfect[1073].’ And Dante, the Italian poet, says[1074],
E come cerchi in tempra d’ orivoli
Si giran, si che ’l primo, a chi pon mente
Quieto pare, e l’ ultimo che voli, &c.
“In the fourteenth century mention is made of the machine of Richard
de Wallingford, which has been hitherto considered as the oldest clock
known. The description of it I shall give in the words of Leland:
‘Being chosen superior of the monastery, as he was now enabled by his
ample fortune, he resolved to show by means of some glorious work
a miracle not only of genius, but also of excelling knowledge. He
therefore with great labour, with greater expense and with the utmost
art, constructed such a clock as, in my opinion, exists nowhere else in
Europe; whether we observe the course of the sun and moon, or the fixed
stars, again, whether we consider the ebb and flow of the tide, or the
lines together with the figures and demonstrations various almost to
infinity: and when he had brought to perfection this work so worthy
of eternity, he drew up rules for it, as he was the first man of his
age in mathematical learning, which he published in this book, lest so
excellent a machine should fall into disrepute through the mistakes of
the monks, or should become silent from the law of its structure being
unknown[1075].’ This machine, if I remember right, was called by the
inventor Albion (all by one).
“Clocks hitherto had been, as it were, shut up in monasteries; but
they now began to be employed for the common use and convenience of
cities, though no instance of this is to be found before the above
period. Hubert, prince of Carrara, caused the first clock ever publicly
erected, to be put up at Padua, as we are told by Peter Paul Vergerius:
‘He caused to be built at the top of the tower, a clock, in which,
during day and night, the four-and-twenty hours pointed themselves
out[1076].’ It is said to have been made by James Dondi, whose family
afterwards got the name of _Horologio_[1077]. In remembrance of this
circumstance the following verses were inscribed on his tombstone:--
Quin procul excelsæ monitus de vertice turris
Tempus, et instabiles numero quod colligis horas,
Inventum cognosce meum, gratissime lector.
“John Dondi, son of the former, acquired no less fame by a clock which
he constructed also, and which is thus described: ‘In which was the
firmament and all the planetary globes, so that the movements of all
the stars were comprised as in the heavens; it shows the days appointed
for festivals and many other things wonderful to be seen: so great was
the admirable construction of this clock, that after his death no one
knew how to correct it, nor to assign the suitable weights. At length a
skilful artist from France, attracted by the fame of this clock, came
to Pavia, and employed many days in arranging the wheels, which he
succeeded in putting together in proper order, and gave it the right
motion[1078].’
“We are informed by the Chronica Miscella Bononiensis, that the first
clock at Bologna was fixed up in the year 1356: ‘On the 8th day of
April the great bell of the tower, which was in the palace called della
Biada, belonging to Giovanni, lord of Bologna, was removed; and was
conveyed into the Corte del Capitano, and was drawn up and placed on
the tower del Capitano on Holy Wednesday; and this was the first clock
which the state of Bologna ever possessed, and it began to strike on
the 19th of May, which Messer Giovanni caused it to do[1079].’
“Some time after the year 1364, Charles V., surnamed the Wise, king of
France, caused a large clock to be placed in the tower of his palace,
by Henry de Wyck[1080], whom he invited from Germany, because there was
then at Paris no artist of that kind, and to whom he allowed a salary
of six sols per day, with free lodging in the tower.
“Towards the end of the century, about the year 1370, Strasburg also
had a clock, a description of which is given by Conrad Dasypodius[1081].
“Courtray, about the same period, was celebrated for its clock, which
was carried away by the duke of Burgundy, in the year 1382. This
circumstance is thus related by Froissart, a contemporary writer: ‘The
duke of Burgundy took away a clock (which struck the hours), one of
the best to be found, either here or beyond the sea: and he caused
this clock to be taken to pieces and placed upon carriages and the
bell also. This clock was conveyed to the town of Dijon in Burgundy;
and was there put together again and set up; and there it strikes the
four-and-twenty hours in the course of day and night[1082].’
“We are told by Lehmann[1083], that a public clock was put up at Spire
in the year 1395. ‘That year,’ says he, ‘the clock was erected on
the Altburg gate. The bell for calling the people together to divine
worship was cast by a bell-founder from Strasburg.--The works of the
clock cost fifty-one florins.’
“The greater part however of the principal cities of Europe were at
this period without striking clocks, which could not be procured but at
a great expense. Of this we have an instance in the city of Auxerre.
In the year 1483, the magistrates resolved to cause a clock to be
constructed; but as it would cost a larger sum of money than they
thought they had a right to dispose of by their own authority, they
applied to Charles VIII. to request leave to employ a certain part of
the public funds for that purpose.
“The great clock in the church of the Virgin Mary at Nuremberg was
erected in the year 1462.
“A public clock was put up at Venice in the year 1497[1084].
“In the same century an excellent clock, which is described in a letter
of Politian[1085] to Francis Casa, in the year 1484, was constructed
by one Lorenzo, a Florentine, for Cosmo I. of Medici.
“Towards the end of this century clocks began to be in use among
private persons. This appears from a letter of Ambrosius Camaldulensis
to Nicolaus, a learned man of Florence: ‘When I received your letter I
immediately made ready your clock, and should have sent it had any one
been at hand to have taken it. I have caused it to be cleaned, for it
was full of dust, and thus as it could not go freely it was retarded;
and because it could not thus run correctly, I gave it to that
illustrious youth Angelo, who is most skilful in these things[1086].’
“About this period also, mention is made of watches. Among the Italian
poems of Gaspar Visconti, there is a sonnet with the following title:
‘Si fanno certi orologii piccioli e portativi, che non poco di
artificio sempre lavorano, mostrando le ore, e molti corsi de pianeti,
e le feste, sonando quando il tempo lo ricerca. Questo sonetto è
facto in persona de uno inamorato, che, guardando uno delli predicti
orologii, compara se stesso a quello, &c.’[1087]
“It appears, therefore, that Doppelmayer is mistaken when he says that
watches were invented by Peter Hele, at Nuremberg, in the sixteenth
century; and that because they were shaped like an egg, they were
called _Nuremberg animated eggs_. I. Cocleus, in his Description of
Germany, speaking of this Hele, says, ‘This young man has performed
works which the most skilful mathematicians may admire. For he makes
small watches of steel with numerous wheels, which, as they move
without any weight, both point out and strike forty hours, even though
they are contained in the bosom or in the pocket[1088].’”