Important 32-pound or 64-ounce bronze weight stack decorated - Lot 123

Important 32-pound or 64-ounce bronze weight stack decorated with hallmarked motifs and stars, movable handle featuring two intertwined snakes, mermaid-shaped supports with two tails, hasp decorated with sea horses; eleven buckets plus one full, the edges marked with marcs and ounces. Master pendulum marks with padlock (three times), inscription 32 between two fleurs-de-lis. Southern Germany, Nuremberg, Master Pendulum Hans Wilhem or Hans Jocum Weinmann, second half of the 17th century, circa 1680 H. 20.5 cm - H. with handle 29.5 cm Total weight approx. 14.5 kg; the box alone and the buckets plus the full weigh just over 7 kg each (complete, punching of the weights probably later, one stack is recalibrated). According to the principle of weight stacks, the box must weigh the same as all the buckets plus the full bucket, and each bucket must weigh half the next weight and double the previous weight. From the 16th century onwards, Nuremberg, which was home to a large number of craftsmen skilled in the manufacture of precision instruments, particularly in the fields of watchmaking and science, became the place to be for master balance makers, who supplied the whole of Europe with these works of measurement. In his 2003 book on weight stacks, Charles Couty lists only twenty or so 32-pound stacks worldwide. He notes that the last sale of a 32-pound pile at the time of writing was in 1987. Book consulted : - C. Couty, Piles de poids de Nuremberg dans les collections françaises privées, ed. de l'auteur, 2004.