Dial

Nothing this Codex could open defines the dial. The British Horological Institute's teaching glossary, in its Practical Clock and Watch Servicing Distance Learning Course Technician Grade, has no entry for "dial" at all; the Institute is a professional body rather than a standards authority, and even it uses the word only inside another definition, describing a bezel as the part "which holds the glass (or crystal) protecting the dial and hands." The dial is assumed known.

Two bodies have written a definition that is not published in full. ISO 6426-2:2026, Horological vocabulary — Part 2: Technical and commercial definitions, edition 3, published February 2026 by ISO/TC 114/SC 9, states only that it "defines the principal terms used in horology". The Federation of the Swiss Watch Industry's list of available NIHS standards, valid from April 2026, includes NIHSG 65-01, Cadrans – Terminologie (dials, terminology, first issued in 1961 and revised in 2022), together with NIHSG 65-21 on the dimensions of dial holes. In both cases only the titles are public, so neither wording is quoted here.

What can be documented is institutional usage. The Science Museum Group's record for a watch by Edward East, London, c.1680, held by the Worshipful Company of Clockmakers, reads: "Brass case, covered in leather, possibly shark-skin. White enamel dial, with hands missing." A national collection uses "dial" as a plain descriptive term for the marked plate the hands sweep, three and a half centuries after the object was made, without ever needing to say what one is.