No subject

century and came originally from Venice. By the 1400's they
were being imported into England. By the 1500's they were being
imported in large numbers. Most of the importing ships were
Dutch. The first spectacle maker recorded in England was Paul
van (de) Bessen of 'S_uthwark' (no O) in 1459-9.
The Worhipful Company of Spectacle Makers of London dates to
1629, and was modelled on the Dutch companies. 

The Trig Lane spectacles are said to be the earliest securely 
dated spectacles in Europe (at least at the time of publication).

The only other earlier sets stated found are from the Convent 
of Wienhausen in Germany where they found 11 pairs, two of 
which match the London example. All were of wood. These I 
have no pictures of.

The frames are identical and the only bone large enough in
medieval times was the Metacarpal bone of a bull.
Each side is 2.5mm thick and held a lens of about 30mm.
The circular parts were cut using a specially adapted pair
of dividers. They had an iron rivet with a metal washer on
either side. The literal split (not cut) enabling the lens 
to be inserted has three teeth protruding on each side and 
is secured by fine copper wires running around the teeth. 
The lenses fit in incised V grooves in the frames.
...........
I too have the Compleat Anachronist I on Spectacles.
...........
I also have _A Spectacle of Spectacles_, Carl-Zeiss-Stiftung Jena,
which is the 1988-89 exhibition catalog from the National 
Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh. Hardback, Edition Leipzig. 
178 pp., 108 illustrated examples from western and eastern 
cultures 1400-1900, ISBN 3361002508.

Only about a dozen pictures illustrate pre-1600 period glasses.

The first is an iron rivetted folding pair from about 1400 AD
which has no spit seams at all for admitting the lenses.
They are a simple wide circle each side with a straight
metal strip running to a slightly larger circle centered where 
it rivets both identical sides, provenance unstated. Three
pieces total, two identical sides, one rivet, no lenses.
There appears to be a groove for holding the lens.
I wonder if perhaps they heated the rims to expand and contract
back on the lenses' edges. 

The next pairs illustrated are made of leather, bone, and
bone, then horn, then brass, all 16th century. The Trig
Lane set is not even mentioned.

The actual invention of eyeglasses is attributed to an 
unnamed glass worker of Pisa about 1286. Earliest lenses 
were convex until about the mid fifteenth century when 
concave lenses were invented. Earliest regulations on the 
manufacture of lenses is 1300 in Venice.

I bought my copy a year or so ago. Probably from either 
Edward R. Hamilton Bookseller or Scholars Bookshelf, or 
Hacker Art Books, all of which are on the web. I think it 
was about twenty dollars. Probably still selling them.
............
Somewhere I also have what I remember to be a Smithsonian
article on spectacles. I had thought it was carefully 
placed in either a book or an assembly of costume articles.
Today it just isn't jumping out of my stacks at me.
............
And I know that in my art books are probably dozens
of pictures of late period spectacles. With the large
amount of those I have I don't have time to delve further 
today. And one of these days I may get around to shifting
the numerous articles, pictures, and copies into more
usable form. Right now that stack would be about eight
feet high, not counting the thirty drawer chests I use
and the fifty + binders.

Hope this helps someone.

Magnus Malleus, OL, GDH, Atlantia, Presbyopic Timeshifter, 
and very late on some replies.

lilinah at earthlink.net wrote:
> 
> Cal at LivingHistory.co.uk wrote:
> >As a Tudor re-enacting spectacle wearer I'd be interested in
> >establishing some real dates for specs in the England.
> >
> >I've got pictures of spectable wearers at 1556, but not sure if the
> >wearer is English.
> >
> >I'd like to build a picture of:
> >a) What year were they introduced
> 
> No one knows for sure, the earliest representations in art in Europe
> are from the mid-14th c. Most resources cite Roger Bacon mentioning
> the optical use lenses in 1268, however another website
> http://users.erols.com/ameen/sciencehistory.htm
> claims that optical lenses were first made by an Andalusian Muslim
> named Ibn Firnas during the 9th century. His work was discussed in
> the writings of al-Haytham (d. 1039), whose research Bacon frequently
> referred to.
> 
> >b) what did they really look like
> 
> Check out Jas. Townsend. They have a replica pair that looks a lot
> like very earliest glasses. They were sort-of pince nez - that is
> they sat on the nose, but had no ear pieces.
> http://www.jastown.com and you can buy the frames there
> 
> Eventually glasses were developed with a loop of cord at the outer
> edge of each side of the frame that went around each ear to hold the
> glasses on - i'm not sure if this was in the 16th century or later.
> 
> In 1629 the demand for glasses was large enough for a charter to be
> granted to a guild of spectacle makers in England.
> 
> >c) did they correct short AND long distance?
> 
> My understanding is that early glasses were "reading" glasses.
> According to the webpage below, glasses for the near sighted were
> first developed in the 16th century. But during these centuries,
> glasses were for people of privilege. There was a purely fashion fad
> for glasses in Spain in the early 18th century.
> 
> >d) when did they become common (if that's the right word)
> 
> Well, although they existed for over a century before your time, i
> don't think they became "common" until the 18th century.
> 
> This website has a brief history of glasses with some period art illustrations.
> http://www.eye.utmem.edu/history/glass.html
> 
> This page has a briefer history, oriented to SCAdians
> http://www.math.grin.edu/~vick/sca/glasses.html
> 
> There's an SCA publication in the Compleat Anachronist series:
> "Issue 1, 7/82, Medieval and Renaissance Eyeglasses - Their History
> and Construction"
> 
> Anahita al-shazhiyya
> 
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