Gilt Bronze Clock From The Egyptian Revival Period, Consulate, First Empire, Early 19th/18th Century

A period clock with sphinxes, dating from the Return from Egypt, in gilt and patinated bronze and marble (Carrara white and Belgian black). The central projecting base features a frieze of palmettes flanked by two mascarons of the god Mercury. The plumed sphinxes are perched on pedestals on either side of the dial, while an imperial eagle bearing a fulmen embraces them. The clock's finial is decorated with a pair of black swans drinking from a reed basin. In 1804, the explorer Nicolas Baudin presented Josephine de Beauharnais with black swans he had brought back from his expedition to Tasmania. A similar example is held in the collections of the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris, Michel Leclercq Collection, inv. 2014.112.29 Original pendulum depicting Mercury wearing the petasos H. 50 CMS Condition: small losses to the bronzes, mechanism to be serviced, slight casting defect on the dial bezel Bibliography: Pierre Kjellberg, encyclopedia of the French clock, p. 337.