The “MJ” Monogram Reverso

A steel Reverso engraved simply with the interlocked initials “MJ” inside a hexagonal outline — no enamel, no colour, no heraldry. Included in the same photographed group as the eight coat-of-arms Reversos elsewhere in this archive specifically as a contrast: the accompanying book text discusses both monograms and coats of arms as period decoration techniques, and this piece represents the plainer of the two. One of nine 1930s Reversos published together on page 78 of a Jaeger-LeCoultre heritage volume, “In Praise of Craftsmanship,” which quotes an unnamed technical textbook’s rule for engraving of any kind: “but above all, it must be beautiful.”