{"id":1000458,"date":"2026-09-18T12:33:15","date_gmt":"2026-09-18T12:33:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ohselection.com\/guides\/history-of-watchmaking\/horology-in-the-middle-ages\/"},"modified":"2026-09-28T14:26:03","modified_gmt":"2026-09-28T14:26:03","slug":"horology-in-the-middle-ages","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.ohselection.com\/en\/guides\/history-of-watchmaking\/horology-in-the-middle-ages\/","title":{"rendered":"Horology in the Middle Ages"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tGnomon, sundial, clepsydra, or hourglass\u2026 Since the world began, humankind has sought to circumscribe the inexorable passage of time in order to measure its intervals for practical use. Toward the end of the Middle Ages, the narrative of time measurement gave way to a true history of horology<\/a> when the first mechanisms were installed on steeples and belfries. This was the era of the medieval clock and the birth of mechanical horology, which paved the way for the modern conception of time. \r\n

\"\"The medieval clock: a matter of belief<\/h2>\r\nEmmanuel Poulle, in “Pour une typologie de l’horlogerie astronomique m\u00e9di\u00e9vale” (to be read in its entirety here<\/a>), notes that horology experienced extraordinary development in the fourteenth century. He adds that one can perceive its importance by observing the increased usage of the term “horloge,” now employed to designate not the various instruments for measuring time (gnomons and other clepsydras) but rather clocks in the sense understood today. \r\n\r\nIn its early days, mechanical horology, like the “simple” measurement of time before it, was a matter for men of the Church: it was monks who imported the fire clock in order to organize the nocturnal canonical hours, and it was the religious, again, who offered skilled technicians the opportunity to design and construct the first mechanical clocks for installation on the steeples and towers of their churches. At times, these were astronomical clocks capable of measuring the course of the sun across the sky. \r\n\r\n\"\"In fact, the first European clocks were designed less to display the time than to sound it. Two types are traditionally identified: \r\n