BIO

Dissertation: N/A

Highest degree: N/A

Fields of interest:

• scientific instruments
• optics
• natural philosophy
• embryology

Biography:
Optical instrument maker and natural philosopher, who invented the screw-barrel simple microscope in circa 1694. First to observe spermicide through a microscope. Hartsoeker worked most of his life in France. In 1699, when he returned to the Dutch Republic, he was elected member of the Academie Royale des Sciences and in 1704 of the Königlich-Preußische Akademie der Wissenschaften, in both cases as one of the first foreign members. When Czar Peter the Great visited Amsterdam, he was offered the chair of mathematics in St Petersburg. Hartsoeker rejected this offer, but later, in 1704, Hartsoeker accepted the position of "first mathematician and honorary professor of philosophy" at the University of Heidelberg, offered to him by Johann Wilhelm, Elector the Palatine. He returned to the Netherlands around 1720. The last years of his life were spent in Utrecht.

Collections: Museum Boerhaave Leiden, Universiteitsmuseum Utrecht.

Residence

• Paris 1678
• Heidelberg 1704 - 1716
• Paris 1684 - 1698
• Amsterdam 1677 - 1678
• Rotterdam 1698
• Utrecht 1720~ - 1725

Occupation

• Honorary Professsor of Philosophy  - University of Heidelberg, Heidelberg
• physicist, astronomer and instrument maker 1678 - 1725

Education

• student 1675 - 1678 - Universiteit Leiden

Membership

• Académie Royale des Sciences
  Foreign member 1699
• Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften
  Member 

Provenance

• Hartsoeker, N., Essai de Dioptrique (Parijs 1694)
• Hartsoeker, N., Principes de Physique (Parijs 1696)
• Hartsoeker, N., Conjectures Physiques (Amsterdam 1707) + several later additions
• Hartsoeker, N., Recueil de plusieurs pièces de Physique où l'on fait principalement voir l'invalidité du système de Newton (Utrecht 1722)
• Bibliotheca Hartsoekeriana, sive Catalogus librorum quae collegit Nic. Hartsoeker. Librorum auctio publica fiet ad diem 16 Juni 1727 et seqq (1727).
• Rooseboom, M., Bijdrage tot de geschiedenis der instrumentmakerskunst in de noordelijke Nederlanden (Leiden 1950).
• Harting, P., Het mikroskoop : deszelfs gebruik, geschiedenis en tegenwoordige toestand; een handboek voor natuur- en geneeskundigen, vol. III (Utrecht 1850).
• Harting, P., Bijdragen tot de geschiedenis der mikroskopen in ons vaderland (Utrecht 1846).
• Fournier, M., Early microscopes : a descriptive catalogue (Leiden 2003).
• Wielema, M.R. ' Nicolaas Hartsoeker (1656-1725): van mechanisme naar vitalisme', in: Gewina 15 (1992), 234-261.
• Clay, S. and H. Court, The history of the microscope: compiled from original instruments and documents, up to the introduction of the achromatic microscope (London 1932).
• Cittert, P. van, Geschiedenis van de verzameling antieke instrumenten van het Natuurkundig Laboratorium der Rijks Universiteit en van het Natuurkundig Gezelschap (Utrecht 1929).
• Zuidervaart, H.J. ‘The ‘invisible technician’ made visible. Telescope making in the seventeenth and early eighteenth-century Dutch Republic’ in: Alison D. Morrison-Low [et al] (eds.), From Earth-Bound to Satellite. Telescopes, Skills and Networks (Leiden/Boston: Brill 2012), 41-102.

Publications

N/A

Wiki and VIAF

Wiki Data: Q719162
VIAF: http://viaf.org/viaf/71525600

BIO

Dissertation: N/A

Highest degree: N/A

Fields of interest:

• astronomy
• optics

Biography:
silver smith and astronomer

Residence

• Middelburg 1800

Occupation

• silver smith 
• astronomer 

Education

N/A

Membership

• Natuurkundig Gezelschap - Middelburg
  member  1838

Provenance

N/A

Publications

N/A

Wiki and VIAF

Wiki Data: N/A
VIAF: N/A

BIO

Dissertation: N/A

Highest degree: N/A

Fields of interest:

• scientific instruments
• optics

Biography:
Jacobus Lommers was an optical, physical, astronomical and mathematical instrument maker. He was born in Gulick (Germany) and moved to Utrecht around 1710, where he had a workshop in the Zadelstraat. In 1743 he was commissioned to maintain the city's astronomical instruments. Lommers made magnets for Petrus van Musschenbroek. In 1767 Hendrik Huijsen (the son of the instrument maker Jacob Huijsen) succeeded Lommers as curator of the astronomical instruments of Utrecht University. An objective glass by him was in the auction of instrument maker Jan Paauw (1804), 52. Telescopes were also in the Petrus van Musschenbroek sale (1761): no. 314: 'een doos met vele objectief en oculaire glazen, keurlijk gesleepen door Lommers'. A magnet signed: 'J. Lommertius a Utrecht 1739' was in the collection Allamand (1788). A magnet, signed "J. Lommers, 1711" is mentioned in the auction sale catalogie of David J. Hahn (1785).

Collections: Scheepvaartmuseum, Amsterdam (a four-draw telescope with a brass cap, dated 1765), Utrecht, Universiteitsmuseum (an objective lens, signed '13 voet Rhinlant Jacobus Lommers ft', two microscopes, dated 1751 and 1760, and a magic lantern), Museum Boerhaave, Leiden (a microscope, dated 1759), Nederlands Legermuseum, Delft (the barrels of a pair of flintlock pyrotechnic pistols).

Residence

N/A

Occupation

• Optical, physical, astronomical and mathematical instrument maker 1710~ - 1770~, Utrecht
• curator of the citys astronomical instruments 1743, Utrecht
• soldier  - 1715, Utrecht

Education

N/A

Membership

N/A

Provenance

• Mörzer Bruyns, W.F.J. 'Lijst van instrumenten in de verzameling van het Nederlandsch Historisch Scheepvaart Museum Amsterdam'. (Amsterdam 1971).
• Rooseboom, M. Bijdrage tot de geschiedenis der instrumentmakerskunst in de noordelijke Nederlanden (Leiden 1950).
• Catalogus van een zoo uitmuntend als fraai kabinet natuur-, wis- en sterrekundige werktuigen [...], nagelaaten door Jan Paauw [...], hetwelk zal verkocht worden ... den 26. junij 1804 (Leyden 1804).
• Cittert, P.H. van Descriptive catalogue of the collection of microscopes in charge of the Utrecht University Museum with an introductory historical survey of the resolving power of the microscope (Groningen 1934).
• Kernkamp, G.W. Acta et decreta senatus II (Utrecht 1938).
• Mörzer Bruyns, W.F.J. 'Alphabetical list of Dutch instrument makers compiled by W.F.J. Mörzer Bruyns'. (Amsterdam 1986).
• Zuidervaart, H.J. Van 'konstgenoten' en hemelse fenomenen: Nederlandse sterrenkunde in de achttiende eeuw (Rotterdam 1999).
• Catalogus van eene aanzienlijke verzameling van allerleije physische, mathematische en werktuiglyke instrumenten, nagelaten door wylen den hooggeleerden, en wydvermaarden heere Johannes Nicolaas Sebastiaan Allamand (Leyden 1788).
• Evers, G.A. 'De Utrechtsche instrumentmaker Jacob Lommers', in: Oud-Utrecht 3 (1928).
• Cittert, P.H. van Geschiedenis van de verzameling antieke instrumenten van het Natuurkundig Laboratorium der Rijks Universiteit en van het Natuurkundig Gezelschap (Utrecht 1929).
• Harting, P. Het Mikroskoop III (1850).
• Harting, P. 'Oude optische werktuigen, toegeschreven aan Zacharias Janssen en eene beroemde lens van Christiaan Huygens teruggevonden (1868)'. Offprint from Album der Natuur (1867).

Publications

N/A

Wiki and VIAF

Wiki Data: N/A
VIAF: N/A

BIO

Dissertation: N/A

Highest degree: N/A

Fields of interest:

• optics
• scientific instruments

Biography:
Optical instrument maker in Groningen. Continued the workshop of Gerrit Cramer. In December 1781 Cremer's glass grinding equipment was put up for sale. In 1791, the Groningen apothecary Boudewijn Tieboelbought the equipment for the optician Willem Trapman.

See B. Tieboel to J.H. van Swinden, 31 August 1791 (Leiden University Library).

Residence

N/A

Occupation

• instrument maker 1780~, Groningen

Education

N/A

Membership

N/A

Provenance

• Rooseboom, M., Bijdrage tot de geschiedenis der instrumentmakerskunst in de noordelijke Nederlanden (Leiden 1950).

Publications

N/A

Wiki and VIAF

Wiki Data: N/A
VIAF: N/A

BIO

Dissertation: N/A

Highest degree: N/A

Fields of interest:

• optics

Biography:
Telescope maker+ wife of Nicolaas Hartsoeker

Residence

N/A

Occupation

N/A

Education

N/A

Membership

N/A

Provenance

• Archive Museum Boerhaave

Publications

N/A

Wiki and VIAF

Wiki Data: N/A
VIAF: N/A

BIO

Dissertation: N/A

Highest degree: N/A

Fields of interest:

• optics

Biography:
Mayor of Dordrecht and lens grinder. An objective glass (64 mm diameter), signed "E. Bevere 12 voet Anno 1709 Adriano Mels dono dedit' (Adrian Mels gave it away as a present) is in the Utrecht University Museum.

Residence

N/A

Occupation

• lens grinder 1709~, Dordrecht

Education

N/A

Membership

N/A

Provenance

• Zuidervaart, Huib, ‘The ‘invisible technician’ made visible. Telescope making in the seventeenth and early eighteenth-century Dutch Republic’ in: Alison D. Morrison-Low [et al] (eds.), From Earth-Bound to Satellite. Telescopes, Skills and Networks (Leiden/Boston: Brill 2012), 41-102, esp. 89.

Publications

N/A

Wiki and VIAF

Wiki Data: N/A
VIAF: N/A