Corpus Clock
A gold-faced clock with no hands, driven by a sculpted insect that appears to devour each second.
The Corpus Clock is a sculptural timepiece set into the pavement-level front of the college's Taylor Library, part of Corpus Christi College. It faces King's Parade where Trumpington Street meets Bene't Street, and was unveiled on 19 September 2008. In that year it was named one of Time magazine's Best Inventions.
How it tells the time
The face is a rippling disc of gold-plated stainless steel about 1.5 metres across. It has neither hands nor numerals: instead, slits open in three rings for hours, minutes and seconds, lit from behind by blue LEDs. Perched on top is the Chronophage, a metal creature somewhere between grasshopper and locust, whose name means "time eater". It is in fact the clock's escapement, and as it grinds along it opens and closes its jaws and occasionally blinks. On the hour, a chain drops into a small wooden coffin concealed at the back.
The mechanism is a giant version of the grasshopper escapement, an eighteenth-century invention of the clockmaker John Harrison. The clock is only exactly right once every five minutes; in between, the pendulum can seem to hesitate and the lights run slow or race ahead, which its maker intended as a comment on how uneven life feels. Beneath the dial runs a Latin inscription from the first epistle of John (2:17), mundus transit et concupiscentia eius, "the world passeth away, and the lust thereof".
Setting and visiting
The clock occupies what used to be the entrance of a bank branch built in 1866. The project took five years and about £1 million. You view it from the pavement, free of charge. It is a short walk from St Bene't's Church.
Nearby
Within a few minutes' walk
