For broader coverage of this topic, see History of timekeeping devices.
A 16th-century portable drum watch with sundial. The 24-hour dial has Roman numerals on the outer band and Hindu–Arabic numerals on the inner one.[1]
The history of watches began in 16th-century Europe, where watches evolved from portable spring-driven clocks, which first appeared in the 15th century.
The watch was developed by inventors and engineers from the 16th century to the mid-20th century as a mechanical device, powered by winding a mainspring which turned gears and then moved the hands; it kept time with a rotating balance wheel. In the 1960s the invention of the quartz watch which ran on electricity and kept time with a vibrating quartz crystal, proved a radical departure for the watchmaking industry. During the 1980s quartz watches took over the market from mechanical watches, a process referred to as the "quartz crisis". Although mechanical watches still sell in the watch market, the vast majority of watches as of 2020[update] have quartz movements.
One account of the origin of the word "watch" suggests that it came from the Old English word woecce which meant "watchman", because town watchmen[when?] used watches to keep track of their shifts.[2][need quotation to verify] Another theory surmises that the term came from 17th-century sailors, who used the new mechanisms to time the length of their shipboard watches (duty shifts).[3]
The Oxford English Dictionary records the word watch in association with a timepiece from at least as early as 1542.[4]
^"Portable Drum Watch". The Walters Art Museum.
^"Watch". The New Encyclopædia Britannica, 15th Ed. Vol. 4. Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. 1983. pp. 746–747. ISBN 085229400X. Retrieved June 3, 2012.
^
Haven, Kendall F. (2006). 100 Greatest Science Inventions of All Time. Libraries Unlimited. p. 65. ISBN 1591582644.
^"watch". Oxford English Dictionary (Online ed.). Oxford University Press. (Subscription or participating institution membership required.)
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