1-158-557 - Oxford Science Archive/Heritage Images

Using a laryngoscope to aid the removal of a polyp from the throat, c1890. A small mirror on a long metal handle was invented in 1854 by a Spanish singing teacher Manuel Garcia (1805-1906) to study the vocal chords. In 1858 Ludwig Turck (1810-1868) and Johann Czermak (1828-1873) both published papers on the use of the instrument, but Czermak invented a headband mirror to throw light onto the laryngoscope mirror, and so on the throat. From Les Grands Maux et les Grands Remedes (The Principal Illnesses and Their Remedies) by Jules Rengade. (Paris, c1890).