Clocktime: John Knibb's Miniature Lantern Clock 1669, 02 History

John Knibb - Miniature lantern clock, hour-striking alarm, signed ‘Johannes Knibb Oxon fecit 1669’.
Join Dr John C Taylor OBE from the Clocktime digital museum as he discusses the history of the Miniature Lantern Clock, dated 1669.
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John Knibb was born in 1650 in Claydon, in Buckinghamshire and was the third member of the famous Knibb family of clockmakers. The first member was John's cousin Samuel, born in about 1625, who established his highly regarded workshop in London, joining the Clockmakers' Company in about 1663. Although to whom he was apprenticed or where has all been lost in the midst of time. Samuel's London career was cut short when he died from what was probably the last wave of the London Great Plague in 1670. John's brother, Joseph was the second member of the family also born in Claydon, Buckinghamshire in 1640. It was widely being assumed that Joseph was apprenticed to Samuel but there's no record to confirm this. Joseph set up his workshop outside London city centre in St Clements and signed his early clocks Joseph Knibb of Oxford. When he moved into the city to new premises in Holywell Street, the guilds objected as he had not trained in Oxford. Joseph then forced a compromise after becoming a gardener at Trinity College in the University. There he was outside the guild's control but he paid them a fine of 20 nobles which is £16, 13 shillings and four pence, together with a leather bucket, though they don't say what the colour of the bucket was. On Samuel's demise, Joseph then left Oxford to take over Samuel's London workshop, leaving his younger brother John in charge of the Oxford workshop. Joseph also brought Peter Knibb, the fourth member of the Knibb family to finish his apprenticeship in London. John made and signed this clock Johannes Knibb Oxford fecit 1669. This is intriguing because in 1669, John was still officially apprenticed to his elder brother Joseph and was therefore officially debarred by the London guild system from signing and selling clocks with his own signature. In 1669 Wadham College had a new turret clock from the Knibb workshop and John was paid £1 each year to maintain the clock. He did not receive his official freedom from Oxford until 1673. It is easy to forget that it was to his pecuniary advantage not to pay the guild fees by remaining an apprentice underneath the Oxford guilds radar. The date of Samuel's death and the date Joseph left Oxford to take over are all around this same period. I would suggest it was likely that John made this little lantern clock for his own use and to demonstrate his clock making skills to his elder brother Joseph. This strongly suggest to me that he never intended to sell this clock. After Joseph went to London, John prospered in Oxford, running the Knibb brother’s workshop. The brothers continued to cooperate together but I can never decide if John's Oxford Workshop supplied parts and movements to the highly competitive London trade, or the sweat shop in the capital supplied parts or movements to the exclusive Oxford clock shop. In 1689, John accompanied the mayor of Oxford to the coronation of William and Mary. He rose through the guilds to become mayor of Oxford in 1698 and again in 1710. In his latter years he moved to Hanslope as a rich man and one clock exist signed John Knibb Hanslope is known. He died in about 1722.