Complications
А complication refers to any feature in a timepiece beyond the simple display of hours and minutes. A timepiece indicating only hours and minutes is otherwise known as a simple movement. Common complications in commercial watches are day/date displays, alarms, chronographs, and automatic winding mechanisms.
The more complications in a watch, the more difficult it is to design, create, assemble, and repair. A typical date-display chronograph may have up to 250 parts, while a particularly complex watch may have a thousand or more parts. Watches with several complications are referred to as grandes complications.
The initial ultra-complicated watches appeared due to watchmakers' ambitious attempts to unite a great number of functions in a case of a single timepiece. The mechanical clocks with a wide range of functions, including astronomical indications, suggested ideas to the developers of the first pocket watches. As a result, as early as in the 16th century, the horology world witnessed the appearance of numerous complicated and even ultra-complicated watches.
Ultra-complicated watches are produced in strictly limited numbers, with some built as unique instruments.
Grand complications
A grand complication is a watch with several complications, the most complex achievements of haute horlogerie, or fine watchmaking. Although there is no 'official' definition, one common definition is a watch that contains at least three complications, with at least one coming from each of the groups listed below:
Timing complications
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Astronomical complications
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Striking complications
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Simple chronograph
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Simple calendar
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Alarm
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Counter chronograph
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Annual calendar
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Quarter repeater
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Split-second flyback chronograph
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Perpetual calendar
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Half-quarter repeater
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Independent second-hand chronograph
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Equation of time
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Five-minute repeater
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Jumping second-hand chronograph
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Moon phases
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Minute repeater
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