Thaumatropes were the first of many optical toys that were popular in the 19th century. This particular toy was created by Dr. Marc Roget to prove his theory of “persistence of vision”. He theorised that the eye and the brain did not work at the same speed when two objects were in motion simultaneously. By creating two different but related images, each on e on a separate side and then spinning the images , the eye could not separate the images and therefore combined them into one single image, the bird in the cage or the dog chasing the pheasant. This later evolved into a phenekistascope and then into a Zoetrope. This fun little toy comes with two printed discs, two blank discs to draw your own images and the string to finish. Although this theory was later disproved, it is a fun scientific game/experiment of the early to late 19th century.