Introduction to the study of the anatomy and physiology of the eye

Historical Significance: Coque was an English optometric educator of the early decades of the 20thC. In his preface of this book he emphasises the legal responsibility that optometrists should assume in the recognition of diseases of the eye. Dr Max Coque (1865 -1933) was born in Lyon, France. He had been an assistant to French ophthalmologist, Ferdinand Monoyer, who was the originator of the dioptre system of measurement in 1872. He came to England in the late 19th century and later, during the First World War (1914 -1918) and was appointed an Honorary Visiting Ophthalmic Surgeon at Guys Hospital. He ran the British Optical Institute from 1910 until his death in 1933. The British Optical Institute (BOI) was established in 1906 by one of the British Optical Association examiners, F. Gordon Huntley, who later in 1927 was a President of the BOA. The British Optical Institute provided training in optometry as did several other optometry institutions in London in the first half of the 20thC. It closed in 1948. Subsequent to World War 1 Coque taught optics to many ex-Servicemen. His last act, in collaboration with Walter Green and G.W. Colebrook, was to complete a translation of Cantonnet and Filliozat's book Strabismus, which opened a fresh angle on the study of binocular anomalies. (see Cat No 154). The picture is a caricature sketch of 'Max' was drawn by one of his pupils.