Since the medieval period, mechanical clocks located in churches across Britain have told the time to local communities, or displayed the phases of the moon and the heavens on an elaborate astrological face. During the six-hundred-year history of the mechanical church clock the design of these timepieces changed remarkably little, and in most respects the classic Victorian clock, made with a high degree of accuracy using the latest techniques, was very similar to the type of blacksmith-made medieval movement that can still be seen in places like Salisbury Cathedral. The gentle developments...