ساعة الجيب

ساعة الجيب

A gold pocket watch with hunter case and watch chain

تاريخ

ظهرت ساعة الجيب الأولى في التاريخ قرابة عام 1510، وكان مخترعها ألماني يدعى "بيتر هينلاين". وينطق إذا الملك "هنري" الثامن (1491 - 1547) ملك إنجلترا كانت لديه ساعة جيب يعلقها بسلسلة في رقبته. ظلت صناعة ساعات الجيب يدوية حتى 1850، حين قام "آرون لوفكين دينيسون" بتأسيس شركة والثام للساعات في الولايات المتحدة الأمريكية، حيث بدأ إنتاج الساعات على مستوى صناعي. قُدِّرَ إنتاج هذه الشركة من الساعات بين عاميّ 1850 و1950 بأربعين مليون ساعة.

Antique verge fusee pocketwatch movement, from 1700s

A pocket watch with an attached compass

Pocket watches in fiction

In "For Richer For Poorer", Tim Allen's character, Brad Sexton, carries a "turn of the century Swiss repeater" which he trades for a horse and some corn with Jay O Sanders character, Samuel Yoder, warning him not to open the back.

In the book and TV Series of Bernard's Watch, where Bernard can press a button at the top of the watch and time magically pauses.

A pocket watch, and a chain for it, play a crucial role in the classic O. Henry short story "The Gift of the Magi."

Frequently, pocket watches in fiction are used to indicate time ticking away, or to disguise far more advanced machinery. Many of these function in a time travel context, sometimes as a time machine (rather than a machine that measures time):

In the TV series Doctor Who, the Doctor has been seen with a pocket watch. In the episode Silver Nemesis his pocket watch (which contains electronic components) has an alarm indicating a planetary disaster; however, the Doctor travels in time using a TARDIS. In the latest series, the Doctor used a pocket watch to hide his Time Lord self when he turned himself into a human to escape a group of aliens known as the Family of Blood ("Human Nature"/"The Family of Blood"). One of his enemies from the old series, the Master, also apparently used a similar watch, leading into his re-emergence to the show ("Utopia").
In the American Sci-Fi TV series Voyagers!, the time travel device known as an Omni looks like a pocket watch to disguise it.

In the manga Fullmetal Alchemist, certified state alchemists are given a pocket watch with a military symbol on it. Real-life equivalents of this (modeled after the watch worn by the character Edward Elric with the inscription "Don't Forget, 3. Oct. 11" engraved on the inside of the cover) are available from various retailers (some of these have the date as "3 Oct. 10" instead, due to being modeled after the anime).

A pocket watch with a musical tone is an essential plot device in the film Life.

In Lewis Carroll's novel Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, Alice follows the White Rabbit after seeing it take a pocket watch out of its waistcoat pocket.

In Robert Bloch's short story "That Hell-Bound Train", a pocketwatch is an important symbol and plot point.

In most fiction involving hypnosis, a trance is induced by having the victim follow a pocket watch swinging back and forth in front of their eyes. Sometimes a wristwatch is substituted, which the "hypnotist" has to "swing" by swivelling the wrist; this is presumably done for ironic or humorous effect.

In the Japanese tokusatsu program Kamen Rider Den-O, a pocket watch plays an important role in the story. It is engraved with the words "The past should give us hope."

In Gankutsuou, the retro-futuristic anime adaptation of The Count of Monte Cristo, Albert de Morcef is given a pocket watch by the Count which is inscribed with the saying "Death is certain, its hour uncertain" in Latin.

In the Clint Eastwood film A Few Dollars More, the villain, "El Indio", played by Gian Maria Volonté, used the chimes in a pocketwatch he had stolen from one of his victims in duels. He would play the musical chimes in the watch and kill his opponent when the music stopped, until the very end of the film when one of his opponents, the brother of the victim he stole the watch from, recognized the music. The song is in the key of D minor, but the sixth degree of the musical scale is noticeably absent, rendering it ambiguous as to natural minor versus Dorian mode. The watch has a "hunter-style" case, with the wind-up at the ثلاثة o'clock position, perhaps appropriate given that the victim's brother, who also had one, was a bounty hunter. (excerpts showing pocketwatch)

In the early installments of the Harry Potter series, Professor Albus Dumbledore is often referred to when carrying around his mysterious twelve-handed pocket watch.

In the manga Chrono Crusade, a pocket watch is an item the character Rosette Christopher wears to symbolize her contract with her partner, Chrono (Chrono Crusade)

In the Don Bluth animated film All Dogs Go to Heaven, the murdered protogonist Charlie enters Heaven and finds that every dog has a "life watch" which designates their state of being alive or dead; if the "life watch" should stop ticking, the associated life will end. Upon this discovery, Charlie steals his 'life watch', a pocket watch, by swindling the heavenly gatekeeper. Charlie then winds the pocket watch and returns to life, unable to die unless his watch stops ticking.

In New Amsterdam (TV series) the main character, John Armsterdam, is constantly seen checking the time on his pocket watch.

In the TV series Earth: Final Conflict the character Agent Ronald Sandoval uses a pocket watch.

A pocket watch that is able to stop time appears in The Girl, the Gold Watch & Everything.

In the modern revival of the TV series The Outer Limits in an episode called Tribunal a pocket watch with a hunter case conceals a time travel device.

In James Cameron's Titanic (1997 film), a pocket watch is one of the items on the table aside from money during the poker game. Incidentally, two tickets to board 'Titanic' have also been bet.

In Sergio Leone's 1984 film Once Upon A Time In America, a pocket watch becomes an important item, symbolising time and the passage of time, one of the film's main themes.

On The Dukes of Hazzard, Boss Hogg and Uncle Jesse always carry pocket watches.

The most recent appearance on a television drama was on C.S.I. Miami in the sixth season Permanent Vacation. a pocket watch was owned by a teenage murder victim.