Sacred Flames: The Power of Artificial Light in Ancient Egypt

By Meghan E Strong

A fascinating examination of the role of lighting in ancient Egyptian culture
Artificial lighting is one of the earliest tools used by humans. By the time we began to paint cave walls, we were producing lamps consisting of an illuminant, a fat or oil, and a wick, such as a strip of fabric or a piece of reed or wood.

Drawing on archaeological, textual, and iconographic sources, Meghan Strong examines the symbolic part that artificial lighting played in religious, economic, and social spheres in ancient Egyptian culture. From the earliest identifiable examples of lighting devices to the infiltration of Hellenistic lamps in the seventh century BC, Sacred Flames explores the sensory experience of illumination in ancient Egypt, the shadows, sheen, color, and movement that resulted when lighting interacted with different spaces and surfaces. The soft, flickering light from lamps or hand-held lighting devices not only facilitated the navigation of darkened environments, such as allowing workers to see in underground chambers in the Valley of the Kings, or served as temple offerings, but also impacted upon the viewer’s perception of a space and the objects within it.

Sacred Flames illustrates the active role that lighting played in Egyptian society, providing a richer understanding of the symbolic and social value of artificial light and the role of lighting in ritual space and performance in ancient Egyptian culture, while serving as a case study of the broader impact of artificial light in the ancient world.

• Language: English
• Publisher: The American University in Cairo Press
• Release date: Apr 27, 2021
• ISBN: 9781649030634

Book preview

SACRED FLAMES

SACRED FLAMES

The Power of Artificial Light in Ancient Egypt

Meghan E. Strong

The American University in Cairo Press

Cairo New York

This electronic edition published in 2021 by

The American University in Cairo Press

113 Sharia Kasr el Aini, Cairo, Egypt

One Rockefeller Plaza, 10th Floor, New York, NY 10020

www.aucpress.com

Copyright © 2021 by Meghan E. Strong

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

ISBN 978 1 649 03000 9

eISBN 978 1 649 03063 4

Version 1

Contents

List of Figures

List of Abbreviations

Acknowledgments

Introduction

1The Archaeology of Light

2Artificial Lighting in Context

3The Language of Light

4Offering Light

5The Power of Light

6Accessing the Ancient Egyptian Lightscape

Notes

References

Appendix One: Lighting Devices

Appendix Two: Theban Tombs with Light-offering Scenes

Index

Figures

  1. Bes lamp

  2. Greek oil lamp, fifth century bc

  3. Diagram of non-spouted open-vessel lamp shapes and known dimension ranges

  4. Copper lamp from mastaba of Kaemsenu

  5. Central cup with wick remains from burial of Nepthys at Meir

  6. Illuminated calcite chalice lamp of Tutankhamun

  7. Calcite lotus lamp

  8. Interior of lamp

  9. Interior of Late Period lamp

10. Profile of Late Period (?) lamp

11. Interior of Predynastic lamp from tomb 722, Naqada

12. Profile drawing of Predynastic lamp from tomb 722, Naqada

13. Interior of limestone lamp from pyramid of Senuseret II at Lahun

14. Profile drawing of Lahun lamp

15. Verso of ceramic wick anchor from interior of Lahun lamp

16. Frieze with lamps from Hawara labyrinth

17. Interior view of ceramic Eighteenth Dynasty lamp from Qurnet Murai

18. Interior of possible limestone lamp from the south pyramid at Mazghuneh

19. Profile drawing of possible limestone lamp

20. Interior of possible limestone lamp from Lahun

21. Profile drawing of possible limestone lamp

22. Diagram of spouted open-vessel lamp shapes with known dimension ranges

23. Interior of possible limestone lamp

24. Profile drawing of possible limestone lamp

25. Interior of possible Second Dynasty limestone spouted lamp

26. Profile drawing of possible Second Dynasty limestone spouted lamp

27. Interior of five-spouted bowl from Sedment

28. Wick-on-stick device from Tutankhamun’s tomb

29. Scene from the west wall of the tomb chapel of Senneferi

30. Third Intermediate Period figure of a priest holding a censer

31. Scene from tomb of Amenmose of priest pouring red mDt (?) onto a lighting implement

32. Anubis presenting red and white twisted lighting devices in the tomb of Nebenmaat

33. Variant writings of tkA as exhibited in Coffin Texts on Middle Kingdom coffins

34. Wick-on-stick device with bent tip after being lit

35. Scene of a man and woman offering conical-shaped lighting devices to the cult statues of deceased relatives

36. Male deity associated with Dt and nHH presents light offerings in the tomb of Neferabet

37. Plans of Eighteenth Dynasty tomb chapels

38. Drawing of scene from the tomb of Nefersekheru with priest presenting light offerings

39. Personified emblem of the West holding light offerings on western tympanum of burial chamber of Amunemuia

40. West wall of burial chamber of Neferabet

41. Plan of forecourt of the tomb of Tjay

42. Scene with priest offering tkA on an altar from tomb of Tjay

43. Chopped suet during home rendering

44. Meketre butchery tomb model

45. An example of a wick-on-stick lighting device created for experiments

46. Burn time of illuminants in bowls

47. Burn time of illuminants in wick-on-stick devices

48. Vignette from the Eighteenth Dynasty papyrus of Nu

49. West tympanum of burial chamber of Pashed

50. West tympanum of the outer chamber in the tomb of Amunnakht

51. Plan of burial chamber of Pashed

52. Vignette from the papyrus of Ani

Abbreviations

Acknowledgments

This book would not be in your hands if it were not for the encouragement and dedication of many wonderful people. First, a heartfelt thank-you to Nigel (to whom I wish a very happy retirement!), Anne, Ælfwine, Nadine, and the rest of the AUC Press team. You all have been a joy to work with and I am grateful for your patience and support of this project.

Kate Spence spent countless hours reading and editing this work—and probably more hours picking me up off the ground and pushing me forward. This book would have been a poorer piece of research without her guidance and keen insight. Hratch Papazian calmly handled all my philological crises, for which I owe him much thanks.

Many light-hunting trips to museums and foreign countries were required during the course of this project, which would not have been possible without the generosity of many colleagues, including Laurent Bavay, Cédric Gobeil, Tracey Golding, Lila Janik, Liam McNamara, Adela Oppenheim, Alice Stevenson, Alice Williams, and the wonderful staff members of the Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology, Ashmolean Museum, British Museum, and Metropolitan Museum of Art. I owe an enormous thank you to the staff of the Fitzwilliam Museum, particularly the researchers and collaborators on the Ancient Egyptian Coffins Project: Julie Dawson, Elsbeth Geldhof, Jennifer Marchant, and Helen Strudwick. Many colleagues, including Mariam Ayad, Janine Bourriau, Alan Clapham, Mennat Allah el-Dorry, Renée Friedman, Peter French, Sergej Ivanov, Friederike Junge, Giulio Lucarini, Cornelius von Pilgrim, Stephen Quirke, Pam Rose, Will Schenck, Anna Stevens, Nigel Strudwick, Kent Weeks, and Penny Wilson shared their knowledge, skills, references, and site material over the course of this project and I benefited greatly from their insights.

I am extremely fortunate to have wonderful friends and family who have loved me, encouraged me, humored me (by walking around my backyard with flaming torches and helping with other pyrotechnic experiments—thank you Helen, Ivan, Matt, and Rune), and pushed me on whenever I needed it. I also lucked out by having a husband who graciously dealt with our house smelling like a greasy burger shack and believed in me every step of the way—thank you, Drew.

Introduction

On April 29, 1879, my hometown of Cleveland, Ohio, became the first city in the United States to use electric street lighting. This was a momentous occasion—celebrated with a gun salute fired over Lake Erie—and was one highlight in a flurry of lighting innovations that occurred during the nineteenth century. About the same time, Paris, London, and other cities around the world made the switch to electric street lights. This was the dawn of a new era, ushered in by the rise of the gleaming, clean lightbulb. What was a revelation in the late 1800s is now taken for granted. At the flick of a switch, light is always at our fingertips. We have forgotten that the invention of electric light marked a significant shift in our human experience. For millennia prior to the 1870s, artificial light required fire—a live flame that flickered and smoked—and required constant maintenance and ample fuel. This dynamic light source also contributed to the environment and atmosphere in which people lived and worked. Homes were dimmer and smokier, flames sparkled across reflective surfaces, families gathered around candlelit tables, lives were marked by the lighting and extinguishing of fires. Yet, very soon after those first electric lights switched on, the memory of fire-based illumination was snuffed out.

Archaeology and Egyptology both developed alongside lighting devices throughout the 1800s. Scholarly giants of early Egyptology, such as William Matthew Flinders Petrie, Karl Richard Lepsius, James Henry Breasted, and others lived through the lighting revolution. While they no doubt marveled at this technological innovation initially, they likely soon grew accustomed to electric illumination. As artificial light became more common throughout the 1900s, it faded further into the background of daily life. The majority of our lives today take place under artificial lighting, but we hardly give it a second thought. The modern ubiquity of light has also bled over into scholarly exploration of the ancient world. Egyptologists, for example, have largely given little thought to lighting technology in ancient Egypt. As a result of all this, Egyptology has a bit of a lighting problem. More specifically, how the ancient Egyptians lit their world is a topic relatively undiscussed, and underexplored, in Egyptology. This gap in our understanding appears to be a symptom of a deeper issue within studies of the ancient Near East and Mediterranean. Artificial light, a man-made source of illumination, is seldom directly addressed in archaeological research. This is surprising not only because artificial lighting is one of the earliest tools used by humans but also because it impacts on so many areas of life. The first use of artificial light, for instance, correlates to the first time that humans made fire. Very early fires may have served as a means of cooking and heat but they also provided illumination. By the time humans began to paint the cave walls of Lascaux, Chauvet, and Altamira, lighting implements were produced with the express purpose of serving as a light source. These were simple in construction, requiring an illuminant, a fat or oil, and a wick, such as a strip of fabric or a piece of reed or wood. If a wick and illuminant are placed in a vessel, the device is called a lamp in modern vernacular. Alternatively, the wick could be coated in illuminant to create an implement that could be placed upright in a holder or held in the hand. These light sources are given a variety of names including torch, taper, and candle. While basic in form, artificial lights can provide a great deal of information about the ancient world.

The procurement of oil or fat and wick material for lighting devices, for example, reflects agricultural practices. The cost of fuel for light, the production of lighting implements, and the possible trade in these items speak to the health of a local economy, as well as any existing trade networks. Light sources can also impact on the built environment, material culture, social structure, and religious ideology. The ways in which artificial light is used also vary between different cultures and provide the opportunity for cross-cultural comparison. Additionally, artificial light serves as a medium for examining the utilization and experience of ancient nights and darkness, another area of research that has been largely ignored in archaeological scholarship. Significantly, artificial light can be examined both as a physical object and as a symbolic element. Similarly, it can serve as a passive source of illumination and/or an active element that inflicts change on the environment within which it is placed, as well as the people and objects within that space. Despite the variety of arenas to which an examination of artificial light could contribute, the majority of publications on the topic have focused exclusively on the remnants of lighting implements.

Lychnology—a subsection of archaeology that focuses on the examination of pre-modern lighting devices—has a self-professed gap in its knowledge of ancient Egypt. Despite the numerous publications on lighting implements of the ancient Mediterranean and Near East, Egypt only features in discussions from the seventh century bc onwards. If Egypt is mentioned at all in lychnological publications that examine material prior to this, scholars remark that not much is known of the lighting utensils there and that archaeological evidence for artificial light is wholly lacking.¹ Though frustrating, these opinions are not surprising when placed within the context of the development of lychnology.

The discipline seems to have evolved out of an antiquarian tradition of lamp collecting.² Due to their small size and compact form, a great number of lamps, dating from approximately the seventh century bc through the eighth century ad, survive in the archaeological record from Israel, Palestine, Greece, Rome, and Egypt.³ These lamps not only survived but were frequently decorated with floral motifs, as well as depictions of animals, amphibians, deities, and erotica. As a result, they were aesthetically pleasing to a Western eye and quickly became a common souvenir item on the Grand Tour.⁴ Their small size meant that they were easily transportable and relatively affordable, two qualities that make lamps desirable on the antiquities market even today. As James Paton succinctly said in his guide to collectors, For many people, to be able to own and handle pieces of such antiquity is supremely satisfying. And it doesn’t cost a fortune.⁵ This aesthetic approach to lighting also influenced late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century lychnologists, who sought to create typologies of lamps and determine their chronological development based on their shape and decoration.⁶ Museum catalogues of lighting devices, which were prevalent in the 1970s and 1980s, though useful, also perpetuate the aesthetic/antiquarian focus as they greatly benefited from bequests of lamp collectors.⁷ The aesthetic emphasis of lamp collecting has directly impacted on the contributions of Egyptian lighting implements to lychnological scholarship. In my opinion, a particular hindrance in the study of Pharaonic lighting devices is that they were not deemed beautiful enough in the eyes of early collectors. It is therefore not surprising that examples of decorative Egyptian Bes, frog, corn, and wreath lamps from the first to fourth centuries ad are well documented (figure 1), while less attractive contemporaneous examples are not.⁸

1. Bes lamp (1987.1017). Cleveland Museum of Art

The emphasis placed on decorative lamps also seems to have created a scholarly bias in opinion that lamps were the preferred type of lighting device used in ancient Egypt. Brief references are sometimes made to the use of torches.⁹ However, due to the combustible nature of ancient torches, which are generally described as bunches of reeds or sticks soaked in illuminant, they rarely survive in the archaeological record. Consequently, this also meant that torches could not be collected and studied by antiquarians and amateur lychnologists, placing further emphasis on the idea that lamps were the primary lighting technology of the ancient world.

While lychnological studies have advanced beyond their antiquarian roots, they still rely on unequivocal examples of lamps. The evidence for a designation of lamp involves either a nozzle or spout for a wick and/or the presence of burn marks around a spout. When neither of these features are present, the result is a scholarly dark age. This term has been applied to lychnological scholarship in Greece from the eleventh to seventh centuries bc, and could equally be applicable to Egypt prior to the seventh century bc.¹⁰ When discussing light in Egyptology, the vast majority of scholarly attention is placed on the sun, a physical constant of the landscape and the primary source of illumination. Information on the significance of natural light in ancient Egyptian culture is abundant, although scholarship typically focuses on how light was mythologized and materialized in statuary, elaborately detailed wall paintings, and even monumental architecture. In comparison, artificial light receives very little attention, primarily due to a lack of archaeological evidence. The paucity of material remains is also compounded by a difficulty in identifying lighting devices. The absence of burn marks or a distinctive feature such as a wick nozzle complicates this process. Similarly, it is not always possible to distinguish between a censer and a lamp, nor to state whether fumigation or illumination was a vessel’s primary or secondary function.

In the absence of concrete physical examples of lighting devices, it seems logical to examine textual and iconographic material for evidence of artificial light, but this too is challenging. The lack of remains of lighting paraphernalia in ancient Egypt is compounded by negligible textual material that references lighting, as well as an almost complete disregard for iconographic evidence of artificial light sources. Admittedly, archaeological, textual, and iconographic evidence is limited, but so too are publications that address artificial lighting in ancient Egypt. F.W. Robins is the only scholar to address the archaeological evidence for lighting, but he does this in just three pages of writing.¹¹ Similarly, Norman de Garis Davies has produced the only publication (nine pages in total) addressing the iconography of lighting implements.¹² Studies by Johannes Dümichen, George Reisner, John Wilson, Siegfried Schott, Harold Nelson, Adolphe Gutbub, Fayza Haikal, and Daniela Luft have all discussed artificial lighting, but only tangentially as a means of discussing a ritual performance or corpus of liturgical texts.¹³ All of the publications listed above examine either archaeological, textual, or iconographic material in isolation and, consequently, achieve minimal results. None of these studies, for example, have produced a typology of lighting devices or a lexicon of lighting terminology. Problematically, they have also all discussed ancient Egyptian lighting from an outsider (etic) perspective by looking for evidence and describing artificial light from a Classical, Western viewpoint.¹⁴ This study will approach the material from both etic and emic perspectives, emphasizing what the ancient Egyptians describe as the most important aspects of artificial lighting. While archaeological, textual, or iconographic evidence for artificial light may not be robust enough to produce extensive individual publications, there is enough material to link together in a multidisciplinary approach and achieve significant results. This moves beyond a more traditional, compartmentalized methodology and allows for an examination of the role of lighting in ancient Egyptian culture as a whole.

This approach fits well into recent lychnological scholarship, which has shifted its focus from the production of catalogues and typologies in order to address the part that lighting played in religious, economic, and social spheres.¹⁵ Similarly, in recent years attention has turned towards examining the impact that light, both natural and artificial, had in influencing aspects of ancient societies’ architecture, ideology, and religion.¹⁶ These types of studies necessitate an interdisciplinary approach drawing from archaeological, textual, and iconographic sources to create a culturally specific view of light usage. A similar methodology will be employed throughout this book in order to examine the role of artificial light in ancient Egyptian culture from the earliest identifiable examples of lighting devices to the infiltration of Hellenistic lamps in the seventh century bc. This necessitates an examination of what lighting implements the Egyptians used between ca. 4000 to 600 bc, what resources were needed to produce lighting devices, who had access to lighting implements, and whether or not artificial light was even a required part of everyday life. It also allows for an exploration of the symbolic and social value of artificial light, and the role of lighting in ritual space and performance.

Answering these questions will not only contribute new ideas to lychnological scholarship, but will also provide fresh insights into social and religious ideologies of the Pharaonic period. Additionally, it will open a dialogue on the sensorial experience of artificial light, something which has not been previously discussed by the lychnological or Egyptological communities. This will include an examination of the sensory profile of artificial light, from producing the illuminants to making the lighting device, to burning and extinguishing the light source. The effect on those holding the lighting implement and those witnessing its effects will also be considered within the setting and time of day at which the light source was used. The sensory impact of artificial light extends beyond those who made and used these implements. Once a light source was made, it was then used to illuminate a space lacking in or devoid of natural light. The reason for this illumination varied from a practical application of allowing workers to see in darkened underground chambers in the Valley of the Kings to serving as an offering in a temple.¹⁷ In both of these instances, artificial lighting not only facilitated the visual navigation of these environments but also impacted on the viewer’s perception of the space and objects within it. Scholars have previously discussed the role of light, both natural and artificial, as a means by which humans experience the world.¹⁸ It is only recently, however, that anthropologists, archaeologists, and art historians have begun to examine how lighting, particularly artificial lighting, is used and manipulated within individual cultures to impact on material culture.¹⁹ Specifically, as Mikkel Bille and Tim Flohr Sørensen discuss in their introduction of an anthropology of luminosity, scholars are now beginning to examine "how light is used socially to illuminate place, people, things, and hence affect the experiences and materiality of these, in culturally specific ways."²⁰ This type of examination allows for a consideration of how light impacts upon and/or creates shadow, sheen, color, and movement when interacting with different spaces and surfaces.

While not previously applied in Egyptology, this line of inquiry provides new insights into ancient Egyptian material culture as Egyptologists rarely have the opportunity to appreciate these objects in their originally intended lighting environment. Tomb chapels and burial chambers in Egypt, for example, are lit with crude, fluorescent floor lamps that drown out color and illuminate a space in its entirety. This is far from the lighting conditions that the ancient Egyptians would have experienced. The light from lamps or hand-held lighting devices would have flickered, moved, and interacted with the carved and/or painted surfaces of the wall. They would have created shadows and varying levels of darkness, only illuminating small portions of a tomb at a time. Similarly, viewing a cult statue, a faience shabti, or a burnished ceramic bowl in a glass case under static LED lighting, as opposed to a soft, flickering flame, creates a very different visual impression on the viewer. This book will therefore provide a framework for exploring ancient Egyptian architecture and artifacts through a new light filter and, at the same time, illustrate the contributions that Egyptology can make to explorations of luminosity in other ancient cultures.

1

The Archaeology of Light

At Sais, when the assembly takes place for the sacrifices, there is one night on which the inhabitants all burn a multitude of lights in the open air round their houses. They use lamps in the shape of flat saucers filled with a mixture of oil and salt, on the top of which the wick floats.Herodotus, Histories II. 62

Herodotus recorded this observation in the fifth century bc during the festival of Neith, patron goddess of Sais. For the next 2,000 years, his remark would serve as the primary account for the methods of ancient Egyptian artificial lighting. In 1924, Norman de Garis Davies remarked on the appearance of A Peculiar Form of New Kingdom Lamp in Nineteenth Dynasty Theban tombs. He described these objects as white cones decorated with red and yellow bands, set on short poles that were either presented before a deceased individual in the hand of an offering bearer or placed into an altar.¹ Although Davies uses the word lamp in his title, he refers to these objects as tapers or candles throughout his nine-page article, as that is what they most closely resemble in the modern vernacular. Davies’s piece serves primarily as a catalogue of Eighteenth and Nineteenth Dynasty tomb scenes in which this type of lighting device is depicted. He does provide some analysis, however, suggesting that these objects may have been used for illumination and/or fumigation.

Flinders Petrie briefly touches on the use of lamps based on his discovery of two limestone vessels during his excavations at Lahun. He does not attempt to discuss lamps in ancient Egypt more broadly, but suggests that salt water may have been used in the Twelfth Dynasty lamps and that this would explain Herodotus’s observation at Sais.² Petrie also suggests that water must have been used in Egyptian lamps because that was the type of lamp used in the Middle Ages and in modern-day Egypt. However, he provides no support for these assertions, nor any evidence for continuity between the Twelfth Dynasty lamps and modern Egyptian types. Interestingly, despite his publication of the earliest corpus of Roman lamps from Egypt³ and his work on the origins and development of the ceramic oil lamp of the ancient Levant,⁴ Petrie never produced a typology of lamps for Pharaonic Egypt. In 1939, F.W. Robins would publish the only examination of archaeological evidence for artificial lighting from the entire Pharaonic period, an area of research of which, he rightly suggested, little or nothing is known.⁵ Robins quickly jumps to the conclusion that lamps must have been the primary source of illumination for the Egyptians, even though lamps of the dynastic period seem to be wholly lacking from recorded finds.⁶ To explain this lack of material evidence, he returns to Herodotus and focuses on the observation that Egyptians used a floating wick lamp. This type of lamp, Robins states, is the hardest of all to identify because since the flame floated more or less in the centre of an open bowl there are not necessarily any visible signs of burning.⁷

Herodotus, Davies, and Robins all have contributed valuable information to the examination of artificial lighting in ancient Egypt, but there is certainly opportunity to address questions that they have left unanswered. Herodotus wrote his observation about lamps in the fifth century bc, and it seems unwise to assume that the Egyptians used only one type of lighting technology throughout the 3,000 years prior to his description. Robins provides an intriguing explanation for the lack of material evidence of lamps but fails to explain how a floating wick type lamp would function. Additionally, drawing literally from the observations of Herodotus may be problematic. His comment on the floating wick likely relates to the visibility of the wick within the bowl, which would have been in contrast to wicks in contemporaneous Archaic Greek lamps that were concealed within a wick nozzle (figure 2).⁸

From a mechanical standpoint, it is impossible for a lamp wick to float on top of the oil or in the middle of a bowl of its own accord. A scrap of fabric may have been able to float on the surface of the oil if it was wrapped around or threaded through a piece of wood or cork, but no material evidence has been found to suggest that this was done in ancient Egypt. There is