came up with 提出，想出

quartz 石英

optician n. 眼镜商;光学仪器商;光学仪器制造者

rigid adj. 严格的;僵硬的，死板的

bifocal n. 双光眼镜;双重焦点透镜

ingenuity n. 心灵手巧，独创性;精巧

 

 

When you think about inventions that have radically changed human existence, what comes to mind? Probably the wheel, the printing press, maybe the refrigerator and definitely personal computers. Then there are those more mundane things that we rarely think about, but without which we’d be much worse off. Like eyeglasses, for example. Imagine a world without glasses—many of us would walk around bumping into things and driving our cars up onto the sidewalk. So who invented glasses, and how were they first made?

当你想到那些彻底改变人类存在的发明时，你会想到什么?可能是轮子，印刷机，可能是冰箱，当然还有个人电脑。还有一些我们很少去想的不起眼的发明，但是如果没有它们，我们的情况会糟得多，比如眼镜。想象一个没有眼镜的世界，我们中的许多人走路时就会撞到东西，甚至把车开到人行道上都有可能。所以是谁那么厉害发明了眼镜这个东西，它们又是怎么被第一次做出来的?

The truth is that nobody knows who invented eyeglasses. At some point in Italy between 1268 and 1289 someone came up with the idea, but the actual inventor remains anonymous. What we do know is that the earliest lenses were made from quartz and were usually set into bone, metal, or leather. As soon as early opticians figured out how to make glass without bubbles and other obstructions, they started making lenses out of glass.

事实上，没有人知道眼镜是谁发明的。据说在1268年到1289年的某个时候，意大利有人提出了这个想法，但真正的发明者仍不为人所知。我们所知道的是，最早的镜片是由石英制成的，通常镶嵌在骨头、金属或皮革上。当早期的眼镜商发现如何制造没有气泡和其他障碍物的玻璃时，他们就开始用玻璃制造镜片。

Although glasses spread quickly throughout Europe and Asia, there was one major problem: Keeping them on the wearer’s face. Early glasses acted a bit like pinchers, squeezed onto the bridge of the nose. Ouch! It took nearly 400 years before opticians figured out that rigid sidepieces resting on top of the ears might do the trick.

尽管眼镜在欧洲和亚洲传播得很快，但有一个主要问题：如何把眼镜戴在佩戴者脸上。早期的眼镜有点像钳子，挤在鼻梁上。痛哦!大约过了400年，验光师才发现，把一个钢架放在耳朵顶部的可能能起到支撑作用。

No history of spectacles would be complete without some mention of Benjamin Franklin, who invented bifocals in the 1780s. Annoyed at having to constantly switch glasses whenever he wanted to read or take in the sights while traveling, Franklin had his reading glasses cut in half and fused with his distance glasses. Now that’s American ingenuity for you.

如果没有本杰明·富兰克林的提及，眼镜的历史就不会完整。本杰明·富兰克林在1780年发明了双光眼镜。富兰克林对每当他想读书或旅行时必须不停地换眼镜感到恼火，于是他把他的老花镜切成两半，与他的远视镜融合在一起。这就是美国人的聪明才智。