Tuesday, November 4, 2008

These old eyes...


...have nothing on these.

These binoculars are probably from the late 1800's. The brass, black-painted eyecups are stamped "MARCHAND Fabt PARIS. The left brass ocular tube is stamped "Day & Night" on the top and the right brass ocular tube is stamped "U S Signal Service" on the bottom. The main body is also brass, but covered in black leather.

Interestingly, the optics on this piece are quite good - image clarity is high even though magnification seems to be only 1.5 - 2x. It's sad (to me) that many examples of Victorian optics can now be had for a song at antique stores everywhere.

No doubt the "steam punk" crowd is slowly turning these devices into fashion accesories even as you read this.

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