Because you use one or more magnifying lenses to make the actual microscope.
Both a magnifying lens and the first microscope invented use lenses to magnify and enhance the appearance of small objects. They both rely on the principle of bending light to make objects appear larger than they are in reality.
The eyeglass was invented first, in the 13th century. The magnifying glass was invented in the 13th century as well. The telescope was invented in the early 17th century, while the microscope was invented in the late 16th century.
Galileo is credited with the first compound microscope. Zacharias Janssen invented the microscope that we use today.
The simple one-lens microscope was invented around the 1100's. The compound microscope was invented in 1590.
A light microscope is an optical microscope. That differentiates it from an electron microscope, a quantum mechanical tunneling microscope and others.
the microscope
The magnifying glass was invented by Roger Bacon in 1250 A.D. The first camera was invented nearly 600 years later, in 1840 by Alexander Wolcott.
The term microscope technically applies to any magnifying arrangement of lenses, one or many. Single lens magnification has been known since about 1000 AD and no inventor is recorded by history. Around 1590, several individuals compete for recognition as the inventor of the compound microscope which is a microscope using two or more lenses. See the link below to the related question, "Who invented the microscope?" About 1670, Anton van Leeuwenhoek dramatically increased the magnifying power of the simple microscope.
The first microscope was called the "single lens microscope" and was invented by Zacharias Janssen in the late 16th century.
The person who invented the first microscope was Antonie Van Leeuwenhoek.
Zachariah Jansen invented the first light microscope in 1590.
The first microscope was invented in the late 16th century. Some credit Galileo Galilei with creating a compound microscope around 1609, while others attribute the invention to Zacharias Janssen in the same timeframe.