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August 11, 2006
Friday Pot Blogging
This week's "pot" is the next oil lamp in the series, a Late Bronze Age (1500 - 1200 BCE) lamp from Palestine.
Like its Middle Bronze Age predecessor, this lamp is wheel made with a rounded bottom. You can actually see the marks from turning it on the wheel if you look carefully. But unlike its predecessor, the wick pinch is tighter, more pronounced and starts further back on the body of the lamp. Late Bronze Age lamps are, on average, somewhat larger than Middle Bronze Age lamps. Some lamps from the end of the Late Bronze period show a flaring out of the rim that is not seen in the example shown above. You'll see what I mean next week when we look at an Iron Age I lamp. This leads me to believe that this lamp may be from somewhat early in the period but, since the find spot is known only to some anonymous, perhaps long dead, grave robber, one can never be sure. This is one of several reasons that out of context artifacts, no matter how interesting and complete they may be, are not nearly as valuable as even fragments from a known context.
Note: while I am convinced that this lamp is authentic, the blackening of the wick pinch is not. Among other things, it comes off with very light rubbing.
Posted by Duane Smith at August 11, 2006 6:51 PM | Read more on Archaeology |
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