What is name of telescope design where eyepiece on pier rather than the scope?

This design is called a coudé telescope (often written coudé focus).

In a coudé system, mirrors redirect the light down the mount or pier so the eyepiece or instrument stays fixed in one location, usually at the base of the telescope. The telescope tube moves, but the observer and equipment do not.

A closely related variant you might also encounter is:

• Nasmyth focus – the light is diverted sideways to a fixed platform on the mount (commonly used on large professional telescopes), but not usually all the way down the pier.

For historical and amateur-built instruments, you may also hear:

• Bent-path refractor – a more descriptive term sometimes used for refractors with internal folding mirrors sending the light to a fixed eyepiece.

If you’re thinking in terms of ergonomics or mounting heavy detectors (very relevant in radio and optical instrumentation), coudé focus is a useful option.

Poem: When the light takes the long way round, by The Bard of Lichfield, Jan 2026.

At the coudé focus the light takes the long way round,
A patient pilgrim through mirrors and quiet steel,
Folded and refolded, coaxed down hollow axes
Where the telescope itself seems to listen.

High above, the sky turns, careless and vast,
But here the beam is disciplined, tamed,
Sent sideways through the bones of the mount
To a room that does not move with the stars.

No shivering eyepiece in winter wind,
No ladder leaning into the dark—
Only a steady table, warm electronics,
And photons that have travelled centuries
Now finally willing to sit still.

The mount groans softly as it tracks,
Mass carrying grace, torque carrying wonder.
The universe arrives not in a rush
But with engineering’s quiet confidence.

At the coudé focus,
Heaven bends to meet the floor,
And the stars consent, briefly,
To be measured.