Telescope earliest existing record of a telescope was a 1608 patent submitted to the government in the Netherlands by Middelburg spectacle maker Hans Lippershey for a refracting telescope. The actual inventor is unknown but word of it spread through Europe. [[Galileo Galilei|Galileo]] heard about it and, in 1609, built his own version, and made his telescopic observations of celestial objects. The idea that the [[Objective (optics)|objective]], or light-gathering element, could be a mirror instead of a lens was being investigated soon after the invention of the refracting telescope. The potential advantages of using [[parabolic reflector|parabolic mirrors]]—reduction of [[spherical aberration]] and no
Zacharias Janssen him to be on the move again, ending up back in Middleburg in 1621. A year after the death of Janssen's first wife in 1624, he married Anna Couget from Antwerp, who was the wife of Hans lippershey (probably father of Janssen). He moved to Amsterdam in November 1626 with a profession of a spectacle maker, but was bankrupt by 1628. Janssen has been given a death date as late as 1638 although his sister said he was dead in 1632 testimony and his son Johannes declared his parents had died by the time of his marriage in April 1632.