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Hooke's Books banner featuring images of the title page from Micrographia with the words Hooke's Books beneath it. An image of a microscope with the words micrographia beneath it and the engraved portrait title page of Antoni van Leeuwenhoek with the words Hooke's influence underneath it. Hooke's Books home Hooke's Books Micrographia Hooke's Influence

Robert Hooke (1635-1703) was the great pioneer, but he was not alone. There had been a few who attempted what Hooke would famously accomplish, and many others who would follow, expanding and refining what Hooke had done by reading the tracts he left for them. Henry Power published before Hooke, but Power's book has only a few crude woodcuts. William Derham edited some of Hooke's works posthumously, including illustrations never before published.

Diagram of Hooke's microscope and other scientific devices from Micrographia
Diagram of Hooke's microscope
from Micrographia: or some Physiological Descriptions of Minute Bodies made by Magnifying Glasses.

Replica of a microscope built and used by Robert Hooke. Courtesy National Museum of Health and Medicine, Armed Forces Institute of Pathology.
Replica of a microscope built and used by Robert Hooke.
Courtesy National Museum of Health and Medicine, Armed Forces Institute of Pathology.


Henry Baker drew precise plans for building microscopes that clearly used Hooke's instrument as their inspiration. He published them in The Microscope Made Easy, London . See the LocatorPlus catalog record

A diagram of 'Mr. Wilson's single pocket-microscope' Plate I, The Microscope Made Easy, by Henry Baker, London, 1742


Mr. Wilson's single pocket-microscope
Plate I
The Microscope Made Easy
London, 1742


Diagram of another design for a pocket microscope, from The Microscope Made Easy, by Henry Baker, London, 1742
Pocket Microscope
Plate II
The Microscope Made Easy
London, 1742

Diagram of a double reflecting microscope (using two mirrors) from The Microscope Made Easy, London, 1742.
The double reflecting microscope by Mr. Culpeper and Mr. Scarlet of Mr Marshall's large double microscope
Plate III
The Microscope Made Easy
London, 1742


Diagram of a method of calculating the actual size of objects seen through a microscope, from The Microscope Made Easy, London, 1742
Measuring the real size of objects
Plate V
The Microscope Made Easy
London, 1742

Design for a specimen box for microscopy subjects, from The Microscope Made Easy, London, 1742.
Box for preparing and applying objects
Plate VI
The Microscope Made Easy
London, 1742