AN ENGLISH OPEN FACE PAIR-CASED POCKET WATCH MADE BY GEORGE PRIOR FOR THE TURKISH MARKET
London, England, circa 1812

Movement: Signed George Prior, London, gilt finished Verge movement with ornate crested tulip, chain fusee, elaborate pillars, No.3104
Dial: Signed, white enamel, black Ottoman numerals, black outer minute division, blued hands
Outermost case: Tortoiseshell case with stand-away hinge and push-button release, the case with piqué clous decoration, mounted in white metal bands with bright cut engraved decoration. Size: 66.8mm
Out case: stamped silver-mounted tortoiseshell with a stand-away hinge, the mounts with bright cut engraved decoration of lunettes, the front tortoiseshell section with piqué clous decoration, the reverse edged the same.
Middle case: George II sterling silver, London 1812, stamped by Thomas Gibbard. Size: 55.5mm
Inner case: George II sterling silver, London 1812, stamped by Thomas Gibbard. Size: 45.5mm

At the turn of the 18th - 19th century, George Prior, a renowned London-based watchmaker, was one of the main producers of clocks and watches for the Ottoman export market. From the mid-18th century until the end of the 19th century, members of the high-class Ottoman society became avid collectors of Western pocket watches, especially the models and mechanisms produced in France and Switzerland. At the beginning of the 19th century, England established a flourishing export trade with the Ottoman Empire, resulting in an increased demand for English pocket watches in the Levant, and in particular in the Western Ottoman provinces of Albania, Greece, and the Balkans.

Pocket watches like ours would have been popular in these territories, often given to members of high social status as diplomatic gifts to build and strengthen relationships or as ceremonial gifts to commemorate particular historical events. Watches, similarly to textiles, played a crucial role in the diplomatic exchanges between Western ambassadors and Ottoman state officials. The distinctive features of this pocket watch like the Ottoman Turkish numerals and the tortoiseshell case became closely associated with the traditional 19th-century Orientalist aesthetic in the West, but they also proved to be functional improvements for Middle Eastern buyers.

Two analogous watches made by George Prior are now part of the Islamic Art Albukhary Gallery at the British Museum in London (nos. 18 and 19).