Righi pattern oil-bath oscillator, made by John J Griffin & Sons Ltd, c. 1910

Augusto Righi (1850-1920) was an Italian physicist whose lectures in Bologna on the work of Hertz in 1894 and 1895 are considered to have inspired the young Guglielmo Marconi. This is believed to be a demonstration model to show how Righi devised an oil-immersed spark-gap actuated by two external gaps for his early experiments with short Hertzian waves. Marconi used Righi-pattern oscillators in his earliest experimental wireless telegraphy apparatus. The origin of this model is unknown. R P Howgrave-Graham purchased it at an auction some years before donating it to the Science Museum in 1923.