The fact that such important and outstanding examples of astronomical clocks were produced exclusively by ecclesiasts in Austria during the second half of the 18th century is especially significant. It is particularly so when a fifth cleric is added to the group, also an Austrian subject although Italian by heritage, in the person of Father Francesco Borghesi.
Although only Father Borghesi's second astronomical clock is now known, it is apparent that this example in the Museum of History and Technology represents an experiment in astronomical time-telling comparable to any of the timepieces produced by Father Hahn, Father Aurelianus, Brother David à San Cajetano or Father Klein.
This combination of five clerical clockmakers who lived in the same region during the same period of time is sufficiently unusual. However, the fact that each of them apparently worked without association with any of the others leads to the conjecture that a common factor must have led them to their individual preoccupation with astronomical horology. What the link may have been is not apparent from the surviving records of the lives and works of these clerics. Certainly it was not an interest in astronomy or clockmaking per se, because other than the astronomical clocks, none of these horological inventors--with the possible exception of Father Hahn--worked in any other aspect of the fields of astronomy or horology. However, after a comprehensive study of Father Borghesi's writings, there is little doubt of the religious basis of his own inspiration.
Father Borghesi's story takes place in the picturesque mountainous region of what was then known as Venezia Tridentina (since 1947, Trentino-Alto Adige) in northern Italy, along the Tyrolean border of Austria. Because of its strategic position as the passage between Innsbruck and Verona, the possession of the Tridentina was contested again and again in the European wars, but during Father Borghesi's lifetime, the Tridentina was under Austrian domination.
[Illustration: Figure 3.--PANORAMA of the village of Mechel in the valley of the Non, birthplace of Father Borghesi.]
Deep within this mountainous district is the romantic valley of the Non, or Anáuni, with its great forests and ancient castles. Most maps do not mark it, and the tourist guides ignore it.[7] One of the chief communities is Cles, with its historic Renaissance buildings. The major city of the region is Trent on the Adige River, with its surviving Roman relics and Romanesque and Renaissance architecture.