A fine Queen Anne walnut eight-day longcase clock, ichard Street, London, circa 1705 The six crisply turned finned pillar inside rack and bell striking movement with bolt-and-shutter maintaining power and anchor escapement regulated by seconds pendulum incorporating long crutch, 12 inch square brass dial with subsidiary seconds dial, shuttered winding holes and calendar aperture to the matted centre within applied silvered Roman numeral chapter ring with cruciform half hour markers, Arabic five minutes to outer track and signed Rich. Street, London to lower edge, with delicate pierced steel hands and unusual lambrequin cherub mask and foliate scroll cast spandrels to angles with foliate engraved infill between incorporating maintaining power lever to right hand margin, the walnut case with brass ball finials to the domed caddy surmounted fine foliate fretwork fronted box upstand above moulded cornice and further conforming foliate pierced fret to frieze, generous three-quarter columns with gilt caps and bases to the glazed hood door, the sides with rectangular windows and rear quarter columns each set against bargeboard rising up to the underside of the cornice projection, the trunk with convex throat above 42 inch rectangular door with figured book-matched veneers, the sides with twin line-bordered panels within crossbanded surrounds, the plinth base with ogee top moulding and conforming line-bordered crossbanded veneered panel to front over two-tier moulded skirt, 244cm (96ins) high excluding finials; 257cm (101ins) high overall. Richard Street is an important but relatively enigmatic maker who is recorded in Baillie G.H. Watchmakers & Clockmakers of the World as gaining his freedom of the Clockmakers' Company in 1687, made Assistant in 1713 and appointed Warden 1716. He was a fine maker who had close working connections with Thomas Tompion for whom it is thought he made repeating watch movements (see Evans, Jeremy THOMAS TOMPION at the Dial and Three Crowns page 114). Street is perhaps best known for his commission by Sir Isaac Newton to supply a monumental month duration longcase clock for presentation to Dr. Bentley for the Observatory at Trinity College Cambridge in 1708; he also, alongside William Wright, took over the maintenance of the turret clock at St. Pauls Cathedral from Langley Bradley in 1716. A year going clock in an Arabesque marquetry case by Street also survives in the Collection of the National Trust at Melford Hall, Suffolk. Tompion's influence/connection with Richard Street becomes apparent when the current lot is examined. The six pillar movement is very well made with the use of inside rack for the striking mechanism and the delicate functionality of the wheelwork echoing Tompion's standards. The dial is clean and refined in its design and utilises an unusual pattern of spandrel. The proportions, external detailing and choice of veneers used on the case can be compared to those supplied to Tompion, and again is very well made.