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The Polyorama Panoptique was, as explained in Wikipedia, "an optical toy popular from the 1820s through to the 1850s. It was invented by Pierre Seguin as development of the earlier 'protean view'. The device was based on Daguerre's Diorama, of which it was a small-scale and simplified version intended for domestic use. It consisted of a portable box-camera designed to take printed and painted cards.

The box was attached to a concertina device allowing for adjustment. This had an eye-sized viewing lens at the end that was not attached to the box. The illustration card would be inserted at the back of the box, which would be held up to the light. It would then be viewed through the lens. Most cards would be designed to include small cut-out parts through which the light would pass. Other parts of the cards may be made of thinner material to create a glowing effect. The empty parts would typically represent windows or street lights, so that the card's scene would appear to be illuminated by light from these sources.

The device also included separate doors at the back which allowed the user to control the degree and direction of light. Cards were designed to change appearance depending on which door was opened, so that a scene might appear to alter, for example, from a daytime to a nighttime view."

Important Added Info: Note that we have given a generic description of this cool slide viewer above, taken directly from Wikipedia. This particular example has 24 illustration cards, 6 of which are mounted onto wooden frames, and the other 18 are not. Since all of the cards have "Wien" printed on them, we know that they are Austrian scenes, and there is a description on each slide in Austrian German, and it seems likely this was made in Austria. The device has some wear, as would certainly be expected with something this old, but it has survived in pretty good condition. See our many images of it. If anyone knows more about this, please e-mail us and we will post it here.

Note that this item needs to be shipped in a box, which might be a fairly small box, or might be a very large box. What is important for the bidders to know is that this item very likely CAN'T be combined with other purchases, because there would not be much savings if any, because this item will be in a box with substantial depth (because the item is "three-dimensional"), while other purchases will be in a flat package, and trying to combine them would likely damage this item. If you purchase multiple items like this (ones that need to be packed in a box), then they likely can be combined with each other (unless the resulting box is simply too large). So please bear in mind that this item likely must be sent separately in a box (the size and depth of the box will depend on the size of the item), and bear this added expense in mind before placing a bid on it (so if you would pay $150 for the item, but the shipping is likely $100, then only bid $50 for the item).