Lamp (100–1 BCE): Art, History and Details

Lamp (100–1 BCE) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

Bronze lamps like this one were used to create artificial light. A wick was placed in the nozzle and oil poured into the opening below the handle. Here the handle terminates in an elaborate boar’s head, with its bristly hair indicated with tiny lines. When the lamp was lit, figural handles, like this boar, would cast complex and interesting shadows. This lamp and stand were not found together, but illustrate how they would have been used in antiquity.

Object facts

• Title: Lamp
• Date: 100–1 BCE
• Culture: Italy, Roman
• Type: Metalwork
• Technique: bronze
• Dimensions: Overall: 9.6 cm (3 3/4 in.)
• Collection: GR - Roman
• Department: Greek and Roman Art
• Accession number: 1953.12

A detail from the museum

Romans used olive oil as their main lamp fuel.

Collection credit

Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Milliken, William M. “Part II. Annual Report Issue for the Year 1953.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 41, no. 6 (1954): 131–74.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.