Rieussec was the sixth royal watchmaker to the King of France and a business-minded individual who saw an opportunity in the horse racings that were popular in Paris in the 19th century. The Star Legacy Nicolas Rieussec Chronograph Meisterstück is based on Rieussec’s inking chronograph, a device for measuring elapsed time using a fixed nib and ink, which he created in 1821 to test at the Paris’ Champs-de-Mars horse racing, measuring the precise timing for every horse crossing the finish line. The nib placed an ink drop on two rotating counters, one for the minute and the other for seconds, every time a horse crossed a finish line. It was a successful invention that he then presented to the Academy of Sciences in Paris, whose members were fascinated by it and named it a ‘chronograph’, derived from the Greek ‘chronos’ (time) and ‘graphein’ (to write), and Rieussec became the first to devise an inking chronograph. Inspired by this device, the timepiece features two rotating counters, instead of rotating hands, one for 30 minutes and the other for 60 seconds, at 4 and 7 o’clock positions. There’s a single fixed index marker between the two counters that indicates the elapsed time. The ‘48’ and ‘10’ on these counters are stylised in reference to the 4810-metre height of the Mont Blanc, a numeral that has been artistically placed in various elements of the Meisterstück, such as the cap and the nib.