This 18th century Oxfordshire Quaker Hook and Spike Clock is part of our local history collection.
Quakerism arrived in Banbury, Oxfordshire during the 1650s, and quickly established itself in the rural area to the west and south of the town during the second half of the seventeenth century.
A group of Quaker blacksmith turned clockmakers emerged, in the form of the Gilkes family of Sibford Gower and later the Fardons of Deddington, who went on, through their descendants, relatives and apprentices, to dominate the craft and create a clockmaking tradition that was to last throughout the eighteenth century. During this time they produced one of the most iconic styles of English country clockmaking - the iron posted hook and spike clock with the distinctive ring and zig-zag engraved dials. Their work is recognisable by the fact that the dials of their clocks were decorated with concentric circles of rings of 'wrigglework' engraving, a kind of decorative engraving that could be done by an engraving tool held in a brace by someone who was not a skilled freehand engraver.
Certain groups of Quaker clockmakers felt that to sign one's name on possessions, or on manufactured products, was a mark of vanity. They felt that when a Quaker died, all trace of his or her existence should be totally lost; therefore some Quaker clockmakers did not sign their clocks.