Illustrated throughout with many colour photographs, a charming and nostalgic introduction to optical history.

Spectacles have been used since the thirteenth century, at first by the few people who needed to read, such as churchmen and clerks.

Later examples were fashioned from horn, leather, tortoiseshell and metal, and as eighteenth century variations such as lorgnettes and quizzing glasses became elegant accessories of the upper-classes, they inevitably became heavily influenced by contemporary fashions. As spectacles and quizzers became increasingly common, leaders of taste distinguished themselves by favouring new and often ornate designs such as hand-held scissor-spectacles and, later, monocles.

This compact book traces the development and use of eyeglasses from their origins in medieval Italy to the mass-produced items of the twentieth century, highlighting their use both as vision aids and fashion accessories and explaining their value for modern collectors.