Labels:text | screenshot | font | number OCR: FACT FILE GLASS WAS FIRST manufactured in Western Asia in about 2000 BC, and early civilizations soon realized that a curved piece of glass had magnifying properties. Eyeglasses were invented in Italy in around AD 1300, but almost 300 years elapsed before telescopes began appearing. The invention is credited to Dutch eyeglass maker Hans Lippershey (1570-1619), who applied for a patent in 1608 - but he was not the first to discover the effect of combining lenses.
