Dr Taylor told the News: "It is my way of giving something back to my old college and to Cambridge - and I expect the clock will last for 200 years."
Helped by a carer, Prof Hawking pressed a button to reveal it to a waiting crowd of onlookers and college staff, headed by the President of Corpus Christi, Prof Christopher Andrew.
The inauguration was followed by a lecture by former Astronomer Royal Sir Arnold Wolfendale, and then a banquet.
Unveiling the clock, Prof Hawking said: "I have been particularly concerned with time. Why does time go forward? Does time have a beginning and an end? Can one go sideways in time? Some of the answers are given in my book, A Brief History of Time.
"One of the challenges has been to measure the passage of time accurately. Dr John Taylor's invention is a true mechanical spring-driven clock, but it also uses modern technology, high-precision engineering, and high-quality craftsmanship to considerable effect."
He said the grasshopper would become "a much loved and possibly feared addition to Cambridge's cityscape."
Stephen Hawking unveils strange new way to tell the time - a little late
Prof Stephen Hawking, the physicist who tried to explain time, has unveiled one of the world's most striking clocks - 14 minutes and 55 seconds late.
The Corpus Clock, a true mechanical mechanism, which is wound up by an electric motor, has no hands Photo: PA
The £1 million Corpus Clock has been invented and designed by Dr John Taylor for Corpus Christi College Cambridge for the exterior of the college's new library building.
It has no hands but displays the time on its four-foot wide face by using a series of lights denoting hours minutes and seconds.
Dr Taylor, a former student at Corpus Christi and now an inventor and horologist, created it as a tribute to John Harrison, the pioneer of longitude, who took 36 years to build one clock and he was still calibrating it when he died at his home in London on March 24, 1776, his 83rd birthday.
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