THE KELCH CHANTICLEER EGG: A FABERGÉ TWO-COLOR GOLD,
ENAMEL AND JEWELED EASTER EGG,WORKMASTER MICHAEL PERCHIN, ST.
PETERSBURG, 1904
 A
clock in the form of an Easter egg enameled translucent brilliant
royal blue over a guillochŽ ground, applied with green gold
swags of laurel tied with red gold ribbons and with a pearl-set
girdle, the white enamel dial painted with green and red garlands
of berried foliage, the border set with seed pearls, the top
of the egg with a roseate pierced gold rondel hinged to reveal
the “surprise” which is an automated brightly enameled gold
chanticleer profusely set with diamonds, its articulated head,
wings and beak moving when the hour is crowed, the back of the
egg with an intricately pierced round gold door providing access
to the complex mechanism, the socle enameled translucent oyster
over a guillochŽ ground between gold flutes and applied with
bellflowers, the lower edge chased with a ribbon-tied laurel
wreath, the square plinth with incurved sides also enameled
translucent royal blue, the front applied with a varicolor gold
love trophy, one side with a cornucopia, the other side and
the back with music trophies, the corners enameled translucent
oyster over a guillochŽ ground, hung with laurel swags and with
tasseled cords pendent from boldly chased acanthus leaves, the
borders of the plinth also enameled translucent oyster over
a guillochŽ ground and applied with green gold bellflowers and
red gold paterae, each corner of the base raised on two compressed
bun feet, marked with Cyrillic initials of workmaster, FabergŽ
in Cyrillic and assay mark of Yakov Lyapunov (1899-1904), 56
standard for 14 karat gold.
The Chanticleer Egg is, together with the Uspensky Cathedral
Egg (Kremlin Armory Museum,Moscow), one of FabergŽ’s largest
Easter eggs. It was long believed to be an Imperial egg and
was credited as such by the doyen of FabergŽ scholars, Kenneth
Snowman, in various publications (1953, 1962, 1963, 1964, 1972).
It was also exhibited as an Imperial egg in several major museums
(Corcoran Gallery,Washington,D.C., 1961;Metropolitan Museum
of Art, New York, 1962; Victoria and Albert Museum, London,
1977; and Naturhistorische Museum, Vienna, 1991). In 1966 Malcolm
Forbes acquired it from it A La Vieille Russie, New York, believing
it to be an Imperial egg, and thereafter the directors and curators
of the Forbes Collection staunchly defended it as such. To further
support that contention, the Chanticleer Egg is shown in a FabergŽ
documentary photograph on a workbench of the Wigström workshop
(fig. 1) alongside a helmet presented by Tsar Nicholas II to
Kaiser Wilhelm II.
Doubts were first raised as to its Imperial status in 1979,1
when the ownership of six eggs illustrated in a 1920 photograph
was attributed to a certain Alexander Ferdinandovich Kelch.
These included several eggs which had hitherto been considered
Imperial (for example, the Pine Cone Egg and the Chanticleer
Egg) as well as three others bearing the initials BK of Barbara
Kelch (the Hen Egg, Bonbonnire Egg and Rocaille Egg). LŽon
Grinberg of A La Vieille Russie, Paris, together with his uncle
Jacques Zolotnitzky, had acquired the eggs from the jeweler
Morgan in rue de la Paix for 40,000 Francs ($3,000) believing
“they must be Imperial Easter presents” as Grinberg wrote in
his notes at the time, later published by Alexander von Solodkoff.
However, this conclusion was cast into doubt by Alexander FabergŽ,
who asserted that they had been commissioned by Alexander Kelch
for his wife, Barbara. Grinberg sold the six Kelch eggs to an
American collector in 1928 for 200,000 Francs ($7,800).
The Chanticleer Egg is one of three FabergŽ Easter eggs with
singingbird mechanisms, of which two also incorporate clocks.
The others are the Blue Serpent Clock Egg (now in the collection
of H.S.H. Prince Rainier III of Monaco) and the Cockerel Egg
(p. 198). Of the above eggs, the Chanticleer egg has by far
the most sophisticated mechanism. It is illustrated three times
in a 1958 monograph on automata,3 which describes the mechanism
in great detail as follows: “At each hour a little door made
of red gold, engraved and chased, opens in the upper part, and
a golden cock decorated with diamonds and enamels comes out
of the shell (fig. 1). It flaps its wings, crows and then disappears,
whereupon the strokes of the hour are heard and the cover shuts
again.... The mechanism is very complicated. It consists of
three separate trains, two of which are further subdivided.
Three independent barrels actuate the five following mechanisms,
here considered in three groups.
“1.a) The clock movement
itself with a platform escapement, this can be seen in the left-hand
part of fig. 3. b) The mechanism for raising the cock, to be
seen in the right-hand part of fig. 3. “2.a) The mechanism with
a camshaft producing the movements of the cock and controlling
its crowing, and the left-hand part of fig. 2 and b) the clockwork
for the striking mechanism, the right-hand part of fig. 4. “3.)
The mechanism working the bellows which produce compressed air
for the cock’s crow. This piece is situated in the base of the
clock.
“All these mechanisms come into action one
after the other, each performing its own task, then releasing
the next train and stopping itself automatically.
“The
clock mechanism runs continuously. On the arbor of the minute
wheel is a spiral cam, which gradually raises the release hammer,
fig. 2. Three minutes before the hour, the hour ratchet is released,
falls into a notch in the snail and determines the number of
strokes to be sounded. At the same time, the mechanism for raising
the cock, seen in the right portion of fig. 3, is freed, now
held only by a light pin pressing against a large lever connected
to the release hammer. At the exact hour, the hammer falls into
the notch on the spiral cam and strikes the stop lever; the
raising mechanism is now released, the cock rises up and comes
out of the egg. The wheel-work is so arranged that one turn
of the wheel lifts the bird to the exact level required. At
the end of its journey, the lower part of the lifting rack meets
a lever releasing the mechanism, fig. 4, for producing movements
of the cock; the bird flaps its wings four times, the wings
are controlled by a draw-rod passing up the cock’s left leg.
This rod connects with a lever resting on a cam, whose arbor
has just been set in motion. At the same time, the wheelwork
in the base starts up. The bellows come into action, and the
cock crows. On the same arbor, are two cams which raise in required
rhythm, the keys of two reed pipes attached to the air distributor
– all this can be clearly seen in fig. 5.
“At the same
time the cock pushes forward his head with a natural movement,
and opens his beak. These movements are synchronized with the
crowing; they are produced by a rod passing up the right leg
of the bird, and this rod is moved by an appropriate cam on
the main camshaft.
“After the cock has crowed three
times, a stud on a special cam releases the striking mechanism,
while the movement of the bellows is stopped. An instant later,
when the camshaft has made a complete turn, the brake lever
drops into a notch and arrests it. The striking takes place
and the rack, seen on the right in fig. 4, is lifted tooth by
tooth.At the last stroke, it pushes an arbor with a free endways
movement, which in turn disengages a pinion in the train of
the raising mechanism. The last wheels of this train are thus
freed, and the weight of the cock is enough to make it descend
into its nest, drawing down with it the top or cover of the
egg. The engagement of the pinion takes place only when the
rack again falls on its snail, three minutes before the clock
strikes the next hour.
“Among the papers in the possession
of Eugne FabergŽ, Carl’s son, is a photograph of another egg,
with a crowing cock, also made for the Russian court [sic, the
Cockerel Egg (p. 198)], but the decoration is quite different.”
Varvara, or Barbara, Petrovna Bazanova, the recipient of this
egg, descended from a very affluent family of Muscovite merchants.
Her story is told in the notes accompanying the First Kelch
Hen Egg (see page 288).
NOTES:
1. Habsburg/Solodkoff 1979,
p. 120f.
2. Solodkoff 1984,
p. 42f.
3. Alfred Chapuis and
Edmond Droz, Automata. A Historical and Technological Survey
. English translation Central Book Company, New York, 1958,
pp. 230-232. |
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