Reference:1500: Difference between revisions

| individual auction estimates run from circa 1962 to circa 1980; not production limits

| movements

| auction catalogues variously say 1560 or 1570; the Field Manual lists 1565 and 1575 for ref. 1500 in its caliber tables

Other auction records fill in the middle years: Monaco Legend dates a gold example to circa 1962; Antiquorum dates a steel watch to 1963; Christie’s records another as circa 1966; Antiquorum and Sotheby’s give circa 1969; and later examples are dated circa 1972–1974. Together they document examples across the period, while leaving the production sequence open.

Caliber naming varies by source. Monaco Legend lists Cal. 1560 in a circa-1962 gold ref. 1500, and Sotheby’s uses the same name for a circa-1969 steel watch. The Vintage Rolex Field Manual lists ref. 1500 under Cal. 1565 in one caliber-table entry and under Cal. 1575 in another. Later auction catalogues often call the movement Cal. 1570, including Phillips’s circa-1978 steel example and Antiquorum’s 1969–1974 records. Rolex used “1570” on the bridge of date-equipped 1575-family movements; movement and calendar-work inspection identifies the caliber on an individual watch. The sequence remains unclear in the available records.

Auction photographs and descriptions document silver, grey, white and champagne dials with applied baton markers. They also show less common examples: a silver dial printed for the 1968 Cotton Bowl Classic; a UAE crest dial that Christie’s says was supplied to the Ministry of Defence; and a tropicalized silver dial with Eastern Arabic numerals. These catalogues describe individual watches; the order histories and production quantities remain undocumented. Christie’s gives 36 mm for the Eastern-numeral example, while other houses usually record 34–35 mm. That measurement remains a single-lot outlier.

The Cotton Bowl and UAE examples are shown below. Antiquorum identifies the game on the first dial; Christie’s describes the second as a Ministry of Defence watch and uses three names for its emblem: “Desert Eagle,” “Desert Hawk” and “Quraysh Hawk.”

Christie’s lists a circa-1966 14K-gold watch under ref. 1500 with a JB Champion bracelet. The inside caseback is stamped 1503, so the watch and bracelet stay tied to that unresolved case identity; see [[#special-branches|Special branches]]. A caseback and bracelet view from the Phillips lot appears below. Its caseback is closed and bears a factory sticker; the photograph shows no movement.

Antiquorum’s 1973 gold watch is catalogued jointly as refs. 1500/1503. The Field Manual associates an engine-turned bezel with ref. 1503, while its 1500 entry specifies a polished bezel. Christie’s 2018 catalogue identifies a 14K-gold watch as ref. 1500, but its condition report says the inside caseback is stamped 1503. These records leave the 14K case assignment unresolved; the other 1500 records reviewed here show or describe a smooth bezel.

==Historical market and auction record==