Nuremberg

Wikipedia describes Nuremberg as a Free Imperial City and, in the 15th and 16th centuries, as a centre of the German Renaissance in art, printing and science, home to Albrecht Dürer and Martin Behaim; it adopted the Reformation in 1525.¹

According to a review of Gerhard Dohrn-van Rossum's history of the hour, Nuremberg kept its own way of counting hours: the 'Nuremberg hour' divided day and night into between 8 and 16 hours depending on the season.⁶

Clocks were made in the city well before watches: the merchant Hans Praun bought a small alarm clock from 'Meister Ludbig' in 1476, and Ludwig Gerung was made a citizen as a clockmaker ('Orelmacher') in 1469 and paid for a clock for St Sebald's tower in 1483.²

Wikipedia and the Walters Art Museum name Nuremberg, with Augsburg, as the city where the first watches worn on the body were made in the 16th century.^7, 8

Its makers included Peter Henlein, praised by Cochlaeus in 1511; Jörg Heuß, who built the Männleinlaufen figure clock on the Frauenkirche in 1509 for 4,000 gulden; Jakob Bulmann; Andreas Osterberger; and Caspar Werner, who moved to Regensburg in 1557.^2, 4

Nuremberg clocks went abroad: in 1506 a Milanese nobleman ordered one through Willibald Pirckheimer, and Henlein supplied the court of Mecklenburg at Schwerin from 1526 to 1542.^2, 9

The specialist trade grew quickly after 1540: the Germanisches Nationalmuseum finds 'Uhrmacher' in the city's death register from 1542, and several more watchmakers named there in the 1550s.²

Nuremberg also made portable sundials, including ivory diptych dials, the rival of the early watch for anyone who needed the time in daylight.^2, 3

Oval 'Nuremberg eggs' came in the later 16th century, about 1580, and the name rests on a misreading; the Germanisches Nationalmuseum's Scheurl family watch of about 1580-1600 is a typical example.^{2, 10, 11}

The Germanisches Nationalmuseum, founded in 1852, holds the Burgundy clock of about 1430, the disputed 'Henlein watch' and a large collection of early timekeepers and astrolabes.^3, 12

In 1905 German watchmakers and the city raised the Henlein fountain on the Hefnersplatz, and held a watch exhibition at the Bavarian Trade Museum.^2, 9