The English word "clock"
comes from the French word "cloche" meaning
bell. The Latin for bell is glocio, the Saxon is
clugga, the German is glocke and the Chinese is
 . |
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Updated
on 24 July 2008
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Year (B.C.)
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3500
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A sundial clock or a sun clock was
first used around this time. |
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1400
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Water clocks were invented in Egypt. |
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Year (A.D.)
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Two Chinese Men ( )
invented the "Water Power Armillary Sphere"
( )
with the function of telling time.
Actually, It is like an small observatory and
"Striking clock". It will tell the time
everyQuarter (Drum) and every Shi Chen (Bell)
automatically --- one day was divided into 12
Shi Chen or 100 Quarters in the Chinese culture.
It is categorized as the first mechanical clock
in the world because it has a part which is similar
to an escapement.
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1086
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A Chinese Man ( )
invented the "Water Power Celestial Globe"
( )
which has all the functions of the "Water
Power Armillary Sphere" and can display
the current positions of the planets. |
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1335
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French, Pierre
Le Roy invented the first escapement. He
also discovered "Pierre Le Roy's rule",
whereby any balance spring
has a certain length that makes it isochronous. |
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1364
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Italian, Dondi
built a clock with a planetarium for the palace
in his native town of Padua in Italy. |
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1490
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German, Peter
Hele invented the first mainspring. |
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1504
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German, Peter
Hele invented the first portable timepiece. |
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1581
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Italian, Galileo,
Astronomer and Physicist, discovered the properties
of the pendulum. |
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1587
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Watchmaking industry commenced in
Geneva. |
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1657
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Dutch, Huygens,
a Physicist, made the first pendulum controlled
clock. |
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1675
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Dutch, Huygens
invented a flat balance spring
for the balance in
a watch. |
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1704
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Peter
and Jacob Debaufre,
along with Nicolas Facio,
are the first to use rubies in watch movements. |
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1735
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| John Harrison
completed the first Marine Timekeeper H1 |
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1787
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Levi Hutchins
invented the first mechanical alarm clock which
could ring only at 4 am. |
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1801
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Abraham Louis
Breguet patented the Tourbillion. |
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1876
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Seth E Thomas
patented the mechanical wind-up alarm clock that
could be set for any time. |
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1920
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Quartz crystal
clocks were invented. |
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1923
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John Harwood
invented the first Automatic
wrist watch.
Rotating bezel to adjust time or perform
hand-winding
15 jewels movement
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1949
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NIST (National Institute of Standards
and Technology) built the first atomic
clock, which was based on ammonia (NH3). |
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1970
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Hamilton releases the "Pulsar",
the first electronic digital watch with L.E.D. . |
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1972
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Longines and Seiko introduce a new
type of digital display with the L.C.D. . |
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1977
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The idea of Spring Drive was conceived
in 1977 by an engineer at SEIKO EPSON's Suwa plant
in Japan. |
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1989
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IWC assembled the Ingeneur which was
able to withstand a huge magnetic field of 500,000
A/m. |
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1999
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NIST-F1, an atomic clock which is
based on cesium (Cs), works with the accuracy to
about one second in 20 million years. |
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2008
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Seiko Spackwalk - designed and built
to accompany the first private individual ( Richard
Garriott ) to conduct a spacewalk. |
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I will add more critical information as I find
it; however, you can search it by yourself. Enjoy
!
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