Illustrated Companion to the Latin Dictionary/Candelabrum

This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Rich, Anthony (1849). The illustrated companion to the Latin dictionary, and Greek lexicon. p. vi. OCLC 894670115. https://archive.org/details/illustratedcompa00rich.

CANDELA'BRUM. A contrivance devised for the purpose of supporting a light in a position sufficiently elevated above the ground to distribute the rays to a convenient distance around it. Of these the ancients had in use several kinds, viz.

1. (λυχνοῦχος). A candle-stick for holding tapers or candles of wax and tallow. These were either made like our own, with a socket and nozzle into which the end of the candle was inserted (Varro, ap. Macrob. Sat. iii. 4. Festus, s. v.); or with a sharp point at the end, like those so commonly seen in the churches of Italy, upon which the bottom of the candle was stuck. (Serv. ad Virg. Aen. i. 727.) An example of the former kind is given in the illustration (Candelabrum/1.1), from an original found at Pompeii; and an engraved gem of the Worsley Museum affords a specimen of the last sort, in which the sharp point is seen projecting from the top.^{[Note 1]}

2. (λυχνοῦχος). A portable lampstand, upon which an oil-lamp was placed. These were sometimes made of wood (Pet. Sat. 95. 6.), but mostly of metal (Cic. Verr. ii. 4. 26), and were either intended to be placed upon some other piece of furniture, like the annexed example (Candelabrum/2.1), which represents a bronze lamp and stand found at Pompeii, of the kind termed humile (Quint. Inst. vi. 3. 99.), which was meant to be placed upon a table; or they were made to stand upon the ground; in which case they were of considerable height, and consisted of a tall slender stem (scapus), generally imitating the stalk of a plant, or a tapering column, and a round flat dish or tray (superficies) at the top, on which the lamp was placed, like the annexed illustration (Candelabrum/2.2) from a Pompeian original. It is to candelabra of this description that Vitruvius alludes (vii. 5. 3.), when he reprehends the practice adopted by the artists of his own day, and of such frequent occurrence in the arabesque decorations of the Pompeian houses, of introducing them in the place of columns, as architectural supports to architraves and other superincumbent weights, out of all proportion with such tall and slender stems. Compare also LYCHNUCHUS.

3. (λαμπτήρ). A tall stand, with a hollow cup, instead of the flat superficies, at the top, in which pitch, rosin, or other inflammable materials were lighted. These were not portable, but were permanently fixed in their situations; and were frequently made of marble, and fastened down to the ground; not only in the interior of temples and other large buildings, but also in the open air (Stat. Sylv. i. 2. 231.), where they served for illuminations on festivals and occasions of rejoicing, precisely as they are still used for similar purposes in front of the cardinals' and ambassadors' palaces at Rome in the present day. The illustration (Candelabrum/3.1) is taken from a bas-relief in the Villa Borghese, and exemplifies this custom; for it stands as an illumination in front of an open colonnade, under which a band of maidens are dancing, upon the occasion of a marriage festival. In the early or Homeric times the λαμπτήρ was a sort of grate raised upon legs, or on a stand, in which dried wood (ἄκαπνον) was burnt, for the purpose of giving light to a room, instead of torches, candles, or lamps. Hom. Odyss. xviii. 306 — 310.