The first undisputed description of a telescope, in the official Hague records for 1608, attributes the invention to Hans Lippershey, a spectacle maker of Middelburg, Holland.
Details are scarce and the precise nature of the instrument is unknown.
The claim was challenged immediately by James Metius of Alkmaar and Zacharias Janzoon of Middelburg. It is now known that all three had in fact been anticipated by Thomas Harriot . Word of the new invention spread quickly, for in 1609 in Padua a similar refractor capable of magnifying thirty-three times had been made by Galileo . The latter defect was overcome by Kepler in 1611, by using two bi-convex lenses, though at the price of producing an inverted image. More serious faults remained.