Marie-Antoinette watch unveiled in Basel -- just 200 years late

Updates on the saga of the famous Marie-Antoinette watch by Breguet. (pic from Haute Horlogerie)

Marie-Antoinette watch unveiled in Basel -- just 200 years late - Yahoo! News: "BASEL, Switzerland (AFP) - Time waits for no man, or woman -- even a queen, as Marie-Antoinette found to her cost amid the tumult of the French Revolution in the late eighteenth century.

France's last queen, famed for her love of luxury while her subjects suffered grinding poverty, was to have received the 'most complicated and most sophisicated' watch possible back in 1783 at the behest of an admirer.

But the watchmaker Breguet -- owned by Swatch Group in its current incarnation -- took their time in meeting the royal requirements, and the watch was finished more than three decades after the queen lost her head on the"

Breguet unveils its Marie-Antoinette watch - Exceptional - Passion - Fondation de la Haute Horlogerie: "After three and a half years, a dream comes true for Nicolas G. Hayek as Breguet unveils its replica of the pocket watch made for France’s most famous queen.

It was commissioned from Abraham-Louis Breguet by one of Marie-Antoinette’s admirers, but neither he nor the queen would see it in its final glory. The Marie-Antoinette pocket watch was completed in 1827, 34 years after the queen was guillotined and four years after Breguet’s death. A masterpiece of complications, this timepiece traversed the centuries swathed in mystery until it was stolen from a museum in Jerusalem."

Earlier Posts:
Breguet Marie Antoinette Watch Found!: "Amazing! I had assumed it (the Breguet Marie Antoinette) would never be seen again."

Updates on the Breguet Marie Antoinette Watch: "It was reported last month that the Breguet Marie Antoinette Watch was indeed found. HauteHorlogerie.org has an updated report."

A Visit to the Breguet Museum in Paris: "Aaron from the Purists posted some wonderful pictures from his recent trip to the Breguet Museum in Paris. In addition to the great pics of the watches, I was blown away by the pics of Abraham Louis Breguet's journals. What a great bit of preserved history."