The origin of the first eyeglasses is as obscure as the origin of glass itself. It is a fact that the first to establish the general theories of optics was the Arab mathematician Alhazen, born in Basra, in what is today Iraq, but who performed all his studies in El Cairo, Egypt. In the XI Century, Alhazen had already identified and stated in his treaties the principal characteristics of binocular vision and the phenomenon of refraction, which could be modified with the correct focusing of several lenses, by enunciating correctly that vision depended on the light reflected by the objects seen by the eye and not by the eye itself. This wise man is renowned by many as the most brilliant astronomer since the times of Ptolemy of Alexandria.

It was not until 1268, however when the English Robert Bacon, living in Europe, made the first comment on the ophthalmic use of lenses based on magnifying crystals inserted in metal or wood frames, the same device which was said to be used by the Chinese to improve close vision since the middle of the XI Century. The Venetian Marco Polo insisted about this habit when he visited Cathay - the Ancient China - in the court of Mongol emperor Kublai Khan, around the year 1270. The first eyeframes appeared in Europe at the beginning of the XIV Century in the city of Florence and even though many attribute their introduction to the monk Alessandro di Spina, many more consider that its inventor was an Italian in whose tombstone was written, "Here lies Salvino d'Armatti of Florence, inventor of eyeglasses. May God forgive his sins. He died in the year of the Lord 1317".

The first painting that shows the use of eyeglasses is a portrait of Hugo of Provence painted by Tommaso di Modena in Treviso, Italy in 1352. The invention of the printing press, in Mainz, Germany by Johann Gutenberg in 1440, contributed significantly to the increased manufacture and improved quality of eyeglasses as the number of people willing and needing to read grew. Principal production centers of eyeglasses were established in the cities of Amsterdam, Nürenberg and Venice at the end of the XV Century.

The Florentine Domenico Ghirlandaio, one of the best Italian painters of the XV Century and teacher of Michelangelo, painted a fresco of Saint Jerome (in the Church of the Ognissanti in Florence - 1480) sitting in front of a wooden desk with a beautiful pair of convex eyeglasses - for close vision - hanging at his side.