Background
Jacob Metius was born after 1571 in Alkmaar, Noord-Holland, Netherlands to the family of Adriaan Anthonisz and his wife Suida Direksd. His elder brother was a geometer and astronomer Adriaan Metius.
Jacob Metius was born after 1571 in Alkmaar, Noord-Holland, Netherlands to the family of Adriaan Anthonisz and his wife Suida Direksd. His elder brother was a geometer and astronomer Adriaan Metius.
There is no information on what kind of education did Jacob Metius receive.
Jacob Metius became an instrument maker in Alkmaar, specializing in the grinding of lenses. He made several inventions but rarely showed them to others, even to his brother. He was one of the claimants to the invention of the telescope and is mentioned as such by Descartes in his Dioptrique (1637). Jacob was indeed one of the first to bring a concave and a convex lens together in a tube, thus constructing a telescope. In 1608 he applied for a patent on such an instrument but unfortunately, a similar request had been made a few weeks earlier by H. Lippershey of Middelburg. This disappointment may have intensified Jacob’s shyness. Adriaen, in several of his books after 1614, refers to his brother’s “perspicilla” (telescope). He expresses the hope that he would allow others to share in his discoveries, but Jacob remained secretive. Before his death, he destroyed his instruments so that, as a contemporary said, “the perfection of his art has died and been buried with him.”
Jacob Metius was shy contrary to his brother Adriaen was who was sociable.
Jacob Metius was single and had no wife or children which cold be a possible result of his extreme shyness.
