The Rolex reference 4262 is an elusive and superbly attractive and rare worldtime pocketwatch.

One name is closely or even exclusively linked to the worltime watch: Louis Cottier.

It is around 1930/1931 that Cottier designed a movement featuring a local time with hour and minute hands at center, linked to a rotating 24hour ring, and bordered by a fixed outer dial ring with the names of different cities inscribed on it. The city of choice (local time zone) was placed at the 12 o'clock position with the hours/minutes hand set at local time, the watch would then display the correct time in both hours and minutes, night and day, for every time zone in the world simultaneously, all the while allowing easy and accurate reading of local time, and all on a single dial.

First introduced in pocket watch form and used by the likes of Patek Philippe, Vacheron Constantin, Aggasiz and Rolex, a wristwatch format followed in the 1940s and used mainly by Patek Philippe.

It is important to note that Cottier remained owner of the patent of the worldtime system he had developed and made the movement modifications himself for the brands using his mechanism.

It is interesting to note that Rolex decided to offer a worldtime pocketwatch at a time when pocketwatches were more a novelty and the public’s preferences were resolutely in wristwatches. However, Rolex considered this reference as one of its most important pocketwatch models and used not only an inhouse pocketwatch movement but added what it calls the Rolex Patent Cap - a bridge that covers the balance.

It is believed that the Rolex ref 4262 was made in 12 examples, a first batch of 6 in 1943 and a second batch of 6 in 1947/48.

The major difference in batches is the spelling of Istanbul on the dial, whereas in the first batch the city is spelled Istambul (which is the spelling of the city name in French) in the second batch the city name is spelled with an N.