For many people in the 21st century, the light of a living flame is enjoyed because of the ambience it creates. But historically, this living light has been a necessity.

In prehistory, people used torches made of resinous wood. The oldest evidence of domestic lamps is from over 4,500 years ago in Ur, Mesopotamia, where they were made of stone or clay—simple utilitarian containers for oil, supporting a wick. Their design evolved, enclosing the fuel reservoir to avoid spillages, and featuring decorative symbolic patterns. Such lamps would have provided the most common source of illumination in Jesus’s time. As metal technology progressed, more impressive and elaborate bronze lamps were developed, appealing to the wealthy in the Greek, Roman, and Byzantine worlds.

The word used for ‘lamp’ in the Greek text of the Gospels (lychnos) denotes a ‘portable lamp’, usually set on a stand, just like the Coptic bronze lamp featured here. The tripod-footed stand is topped by a drip-tray, from which rises the pricket for the lamp. A sturdy lid secures the lamp’s oil reservoir. The nozzle, from which the wick was lit, is quite large. The handle is of double-rod form, with two volutes converging on a central leaf-shape, topped by a cross, a symbolically protective ‘thumb rest’. The volutes feature short leaves, and two tiny birds: a common motif, evoking the dawn chorus heralding the coming of light.

Whilst modest households often had to make do with cheaper, bad-smelling fuels, such as fish oil or tallow, this elegant lamp would have burned bright with fragrant olive oil. It was a commodity widely available across the Mediterranean world, imbued with religious significance and additional positive connotations of peace, friendship, prosperity, hope, and rebirth, all extensively shared amongst many cultures.

References

Buckton, David (ed.). 1994. Byzantium: Treasures of Byzantine Art and Culture (London: British Museum Press)