We saw this phenomenon allready many times: they must have had magnifying glasses and microscopes long before the invention dates in our history books. This because there are very old images found of
microscopic organisms that are to precise to be just a coincedence. What we know is that around1700 AC the 'patents' were introduced in France and that the world followed that doing in no time. One of the first patents in France were on the name of Fresnell: for the Fresnell lenses, used for light towers. Before that time, the inventions were just not made public at all. One of the oldest lenses were made from kristal and dates from around 200 bc. But there were allready many stories about far older lenses.