Glass Lamps from Medieval Layers of Chersonese

Abstract

This article analyses different types of lamps uncovered from medieval layers in Chersonese. All the types were widespread in the Mediterranean – Black Sea area; almost all of them appeared in the Early Byzantine Period and existed throughout the Middle Ages, and some are still produced. Yet their use in Chersonese had its own specifics: some types appeared somewhat later than in other territories of the Empire; others, for example, the lamps with a solid stem with intercepts or lamps with a glass tube for wick, were absent, and the proportion of different types changed over time. The first glass vessels used in Chersonese as lighting devices similarly to other centres of the Byzantine world were conical goblets with a rounded or pointed bottom, which predominated in the fourth and fifth centuries. In the sixth century, conical lamps with a drop-shaped stem appeared and existed in Chersonese up to the end of the city, although in other centers of the Byzantine world they have been fixed exclusively in the early Byzantine complexes. Lamps with a narrow hollow stem, which appeared in the late fifth century, predominated through the Early Byzantine Period. Later on, they were replaced by lamps with a small hollow drop-shaped stem, revealed in Chersonese in the assemblages dated up to the late thirteenth century. Vessels with a short spherical stem used in other byzantine centers from the early Byzantine period, in Chersonese occur in deposits of the 13th century, with the exception of one specimen found in the complex of the eleventh – twelfth centuries. The same can be said about the lamps with a cylindrical stem drawn from the body of the vessel: in other Mediterranean regions, they were in use from the Early Byzantine Period, while in Chersonese they occurred exclusively in the eleventh – twelfth centuries assemblages. Solid long stems, fashioned separately from the body of the vessel, were found not only in the eleventh – twelfth centuries assemblages, but also in those from a later period. There are only two finds of the lamps featuring a long stem with a spherical ending in Chersonese, originating from the assemblages dated from the second half of the sixth and the thirteenth centuries, which, in general, corresponds to the period of existence of this type of lamps in other centers. Numerous and various handled lamps will be the subject of a separate publication.