Portable telescope

The papier-mâché barrel of this non-achromatic telescope is decorated with coloured floral motifs. The fittings are made of horn and include screw-on caps for both ends. Stop lines on the three draw tubes indicate the telescope's optimum working length. The telescope may be Italian, since the decoration is similar to that on a telescope made in Venice, although there are also similarities to papier-mâché items produced in Russia in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.