Hand blown prosthetic glass eyes were needed because of incurable eye diseases and irreparable ocular injuries. In the past, many eye diseases had less than adequate treatments. This eventuated in the eye being lost and finally removed and replaced with a cosmetic glass eye. Of course there were the various wars to keep the glass eye makers busy as well.
This set of glass eyes was made around 1900.
Today’s “artificial eyes” are made from acrylic. These began to be made in response to World War II when the Germans could no longer be a source of high quality blown-glass eyes.
This set was made by expert glass blowers in various sizes and colors. There are 21 intact glass eyes, one of which has a defectively colored sclera. There are also 5 broken glass eyes which are useful for seeing the structure of the remaining glass eyes.
The container box is corrugated “cardboard” which shows these were from after 1890 when cardboard boxes were invented. The label says “J. Janicot” and is from Bagnolet (just outside of Paris, France)