the.com/peephole
a fisheye lens turning your hallway into a paranoid funhouse mirror
means A small hole or opening, often in a door, through which you can look to see who's on the other side without opening up.
from A plain English compound of "peep" and "hole." "Peep" — to glance furtively or peer through a narrow gap — appeared in late Middle English, possibly imitative of the quick, darting nature of the act (and a cousin of "peek"). Bolted onto "hole," it gave a word for any tiny aperture made for spying, in use for centuries before doors got their tell-tale fisheye lenses.
- invented
- credited to a woman, Sara Little Turnbull, mid-1900s
- reverse trick
- cheap gadgets let outsiders peep back inside
- fisheye optics
- wide view comes at heavy image distortion
- door dweller
- called a door viewer in security catalogs
door viewer — standard 160-degree fisheye lens installed in residential doors since the 1960s
glory hole glassblowing — reheating chamber in glass furnaces where artisans observe molten glass at 2000°f