Speculum


From Encyclopedia Britannica (11th edition, 1910)

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Speculum, the Latin word for a mirror, employed more particularly for a metallic mirror used in a reflecting telescope. In early instruments metallic mirrors, made from an alloy of copper and tin, with the addition of a little arsenic or other metals to increase the whiteness, were customarily employed, but they have now been displaced by the more converiient silveron-glass mirror (see Telescope). Various forms of specula are used in surgery for examining internal organs.