Christiaan Huygens – A family affair - Proeven van Vroeger

ii. Making and distributing instruments
The family Huygens had a small “history” with the making of and interest for
(scientific) instruments. Constantijn Sr.’s fascination for instruments has been explained by
several as being developed during his diplomatic missions with Van Aerssen to England in the
early 1620s. He came to know Nicholas de Caus and, according to his own testimony, became
good friends with Cornelis Drebbel. Their machines and instruments – their “air- and water-
driven engines,” ornamenting the magnificent gardens at court, theatrical machines and
microscopes 336 – fascinated Constantijn Sr.. He developed a particular liking for optical
instruments, probably triggered by his own bad sight and need for glasses since the age of
sixteen. 337 In the years 1635-1638, Constantijn Sr. actively helped Descartes and his young
student Van Schooten (who later became Christiaan’s mathematics-teacher) in the
philosopher’s attempts to improve micro- and telescopes, by taking care of the development
process of a grinding-machine for hyperbole lenses. He guarded the production process at the
grinder 338 and advised Descartes on different practical and theoretical aspects, developing his
skills as an optician to such an extent that he could promise Princess Elizabeth Palatine in1654
that “I could serve as a sufficient enough Optician.” 339
The skill of grinding lenses and making optical instruments was taken over by
Christiaan and his brother Constantijn. They worked together successfully; they developed a
new eyepiece (later called the “Huygens-eyepiece”) and devised a telescope that first
“revealed” the ring around Saturn and with which Christiaan directly challenged “Divini’s
position as Europe’s best optician.” 340 Though it is unclear precisely how the work was divided
between Christiaan Jr. and Constantijn Jr., it seems that they had a similar role in the actual
grinding of the lenses, the making of the telescope and doing the observations. When
Christiaan was in Paris in 1655, Constantijn Jr. wrote from The Hague to notify his brother
336 BACHRACH, A. G. H. (1980) The role of the Huygens family in seventeenth-century Dutch
culture. IN BOS, H. J. M., RUDWICK, M. J. S., SNELDERS, H. A. M. & VISSER, R. P. W. (Eds.)
Studies on Christiaan Huygens : invited papers from the Symposium on the Life and Work of Christiaan Huygens,
Amsterdam, 22-25 August 1979. Lisse, Swets & Zeitlinger., p46
337 "Hoc anno coepi perspicillo uti" – “This year I started to wear eye-glasses”, is the entry on 1612 in
Constantijn’s diary. HUYGENS, C. & UNGER, J. H. W. (1885) Dagboek van Constantyn Huygens. Voor
de eerste maal naar het afschrift van diens kleinzoon uitgegeven, Amsterdam,, Gebr. Binger., p8
338 HUYGENS, C. (1911) BW., Vol. 19, xiv
339 HUYGENS, C. (1888) OC., Vol. I, No. 210. “Ce que madame Bret me rapporte des incommoditez,
que Vostre Altesse [the Princess] rencontre en sa veuë me [Constantijn Sr.] faict croire que dans une
heure de conference je pourroy la seruir d’assez bon Lunettier. Il n’y a que le medicus passiuus.”
340 RIGHINI BONELLI, M. L. & VAN HELDEN, A. (1981) Divini and Campani: A Forgotten
Chapter in the History of the Accademia del Cimento. Annali Dell'Istituto E Museo Di Storia Della Scienza
Di Firenze, 1-176., p11-2. Constantijn Jr.’s dedicatory poem at the beginning of the Systema Saturnium
should perhaps best be regarded as a share in the attention and honor as well as an opportunity to raise
that of his brother.
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