Factory Lamp

1 of 3

Artist
Name	Unknown
Basic Info
Alternative Title	Lamp with Upright Bar and Suspension Hole
Period	Roman Imperial period
Created in	Ancient & Byzantine World
Century	1st-2nd century CE
Culture	Roman
Dimensions	8.1 x 6.5 x 10.3 x 0.6 cm (3 3/16 x 2 9/16 x 4 1/16 x 3/16 in.)
Harvard Museum
Department	Department of Ancient and Byzantine Art & Numismatics
Division	Asian and Mediterranean Art
Contact	am_asianmediterranean@harvard.edu

Context

The shape of this piece is typical of factory lamps (1), but the volutes of the nozzle are poorly defined and lump-like on both sides and on the back. The lamp has no handle, but the hole in the back might indicate that it had one originally. A center suspension bar is set parallel to the nozzle; it is fully preserved but bent. On the top of the reservoir, on each side of the bar, is a hole. The right hole is round (0.65 cm); the left hole was apparently originally oval (0.83 cm maximum diameter). The disc is concave within a raised rim, which extends along the top of the nozzle to form a channel to the wick hole. The wall is unusually thick. The nozzle is 2.8 cm long, the height of the reservoir is 3.9 cm, and the height of the suspension bar is 4.6 cm.
 
Factory lamps were mass-produced in Italy starting in the second half of the first century CE and continued through the second century CE. The poor quality of this piece suggests a late date.
 
NOTES:
 
1. It is close to M. Conticello de’ Spagnolis and E. De Carolis, Le lucerne di bronzo, Musei della Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana Inventari e Studi 1 (Vatican City, 1986) 37-38, no. 12, which is dated to the second century CE. For general discussion of factory lamps, their manufacturers, and their ceramic equivalents, see D. M. Bailey, A Catalogue of the Lamps in the British Museum 2: Roman Lamps Made in Italy (London, 1980) 271; the closest is inv. no. Q1172 from the Fortis factory dated in the late first to the second half of the second century CE. 
 
Jane Ayer Scott

TechnicalDetails

Chemical Composition

Technical Observations

Six of the seven lamps (1920.44.181, 1965.87, 1977.216.3406, 1977.216.3407, 1977.216.3423, 1978.495.32, and 1992.256.93) have mostly green patinas. 1977.216.3407 is mostly brown and black with areas of dark green. 1977.216.3423 has a large area of blue. 1978.495.32 and 1920.44.181 are more mineralized, and large lumps of raised corrosion products obscure the finer details of their surfaces. 1920.44.181 has lost the tip of its spout and much of its handle due to its fragile, mineralized condition. 
 
All of the lamps except 1977.216.3406 were cast, presumably using a lost-wax technique. The interior surfaces generally conform to the exterior profiles, including the small feet, and it is likely that molds were used to form the wax models of the main portions of these lamps. The perfectly circular central elements may be the result of using a wheel to create the original models from which the wax casting molds were made. These shapes were then altered manually to form the spouts and decorative elements. The handles were probably added manually to the cast-wax body models. The rather substantial handle of 1965.87 could easily have been molded at the same time as the body of the lamp, although there is no indentation in the interior to prove this. The separately cast lid on this lamp is intact and held in place with an oversized—but seemingly original—copper alloy pin. 
 
The bowl section of 1977.216.3406 is so thin and its interior surface is so smooth that it appears to have been raised rather than cast. Its thickness varies between 0.5 and 1.0 mm. An x-radiograph of the lamp reveals distinct hammer marks, which confirm that the surface was raised. The cast base is attached with lead solder. Its shape is perfectly circular, implying that its model was turned on a wheel. A projecting rim at the bottom of the base indicates that it was attached to a larger base section or mount. Solder is also present there and at a spot at the back of the lamp, where a handle had been attached but is now lost. 
 
The exterior surface of 1920.44.181 has elongated fiber-shaped carbon inclusions embedded in its corrosion products. All of the lamps, except 1977.216.3406, appear to have oil residues mixed with accretions and corrosion products in their interiors.
 
Henry Lie (submitted 2001)

Harvard Art Museums/Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Transfer from the Department of the Classics, Harvard University