15 Facts About Ahasuerus Fromanteel

Ahasuerus Fromanteel was a clockmaker, the first maker of pendulum clocks in Britain.

Ahasuerus Fromanteel was the first of five children born to Leah and Mordecai Fromanteel, a wood turner.

Ahasuerus Fromanteel was apprenticed for seven years to a blacksmith, before settling in London in 1629.

Ahasuerus Fromanteel began as a crafter of steeple clocks in East Smithfield, near the Tower of London, becoming a member of Worshipful Company of Blacksmiths in 1631.

Ahasuerus Fromanteel made lantern clocks with balance wheel escapement, and spring-driven table clocks, and joined the Clockmakers' Guild in 1632.

In 1658 Ahasuerus Fromanteel were taken before the guild for hiring more apprentices than the rules stipulated, which suggests that the firm was thriving.

Ahasuerus Fromanteel developed microscopes and lenses, building on the work of Cornelis Drebbel and Benjamin Worsley in Amsterdam.

Ahasuerus Fromanteel married Maria de Bruijne in 1631 and together they had eight children of whom four became clockmakers themselves.

From birth Ahasuerus Fromanteel was involved with the Dutch Reformed church, however he and his wife were rebaptised and formally transferred to the Baptist faith.

In 1657 Ahasuerus's son John Fromanteel began studying pendulum clocks, invented by Christiaan Huygens.

Therefore, there is not much academic scholarship to be associated with Macey's argument that Ahasuerus Fromanteel was guilty of any form of espionage.

Ahasuerus Fromanteel became the first maker of pendulum clocks in England, although this distinction has been claimed by horologists Richard Harris and Robert Hooke.

Ahasuerus Fromanteel used the design for regulating steeple and domestic clocks and sold them from the family house in Southwark and at the a shop in Lothbury, which had been a famous retailer of clocks for more than a hundred years.

The Ahasuerus Fromanteel family sold weight-driven clocks, watches that needed only a single annual winding and a variety of domestic and industrial engines, selling to the city of Norwich one of his patent fire engines.

Ahasuerus Fromanteel had gained the notice and patronage of "The Lord Protector", Oliver Cromwell, Britain's interregnum head of state.