There are 239
pottery Roman oil lamps in the Crofts Collection. They are from locations and time periods
spanning the Roman Empire which is reflected in their styles. In this post we’re going to take a detailed
look at some of the lamps in the collection, however if you’d like to see more
you can explore the collection on the Hull Museums Collections website.
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| (c) Hull and East Riding Museum: Hull Museums |
This lamp has two opposed nozzles and a central node handle (which is a
small stub projecting out of the centre of the lamp). The two small holes on either side of the
central circle would have been used to fill the oil lamp with fuel. This would have been vegetable oil (e.g.
olive oil) or animal fat. The hole at
the end of each nozzle is a wick hole, where the fabric or fibrous wick would
have been placed. You can still see
traces of black soot on the wick holes from where the flame burned. The style of this lamp is similar to those
made in Ephesus, Turkey. Ephesus is
first mentioned in history in the 7th century BC. It was incorporated into the Roman Empire in
133BC and later became the first city (capital) of the Roman province of Asia. It had many impressive public buildings such
as temples, triumphal arches and a theatre which can still been seen today.
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| (c) Hull and East Riding Museum: Hull Museums |
Known as a Vogelkopflampe or bird head lamp, this style of lamp was
popular from 100BC – 100AD. Earlier
versions of this type of lamp have two birds depicted on the nozzle, which is
how this type of lamp got its name.
Later on, this style of lamp no longer has the bird decoration. Instead they have parallel incised lines on
the nozzle, like this one. The shape of
the lamp is very distinctive, with a dovetail or flared nozzle with wick hole
and a handle that curves upwards from the body of the lamp at the back.
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| (c) Hull and East Riding Museum: Hull Museums |
The goddess Victoria is depicted on this lamp. She was the personification of victory and
was important in Roman society. She
was a symbol of conquering death and would decide who would be victorious
during war. For this reason, she was worshipped
by generals when they returned from war.
The goddess was depicted on lots of different things in Roman culture
including coins, jewellery and architecture.
On this lamp, she is depicted as winged victory – representing the
spirit of victory. She holds a palm leaf
in her left hand and a laurel wreath in her right hand. Both of these objects were symbols of victory
in Roman culture and are associated with the goddess Victoria. This lamp is from Kourion (Curium) in Cyprus
(for more information, read our previous post on Cypriot objects in the
Crofts Collection). It has a volute
nozzle – volute describes the scroll-like shapes on either side of the nozzle –
and a round discus (the central, circular bit of the lamp that is decorated
with Victoria).
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| (c) Hull and East Riding Museum: Hull Museums |
Another lamp with a decorated discus, this time it’s a floral motif
with the filling hole in the centre and petals radiating from it. This lamp has a rounded nozzle and no
handle. There are traces of soot around
the wick hole from when the flame would have burned there.
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| (c) Hull and East Riding Museum: Hull Museums |
This lamp is rectangular in shape with multiple nozzles (five in total,
which still have black sooting around them).
It also has three filling holes: one large hole in the middle and one
either side of it. These smaller holes
are decorated with four petals radiating from the hole. The lamp is from Egypt, it falls within the
Greco-Roman period (332BC – 400AD) probably dating to 100BC – 100AD.
Many of the
lamps on display in the Roman Galleries in Hull and East Riding Museum are from
the Crofts Collection. So next time
you’re able to, why not pop in and see them?
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