Lamp with Quadriga

Lamp with Quadriga

Buff clay, reddish-brown glossy slip. Slip worn on upper part of body, underneath volutes, along the shoulders edge and small area on discus figure. Slip darker in low areas of discus figure. Fine cracks in slip surface over entire lamp. Slip chipped away in small spots on rim, on foreground horse of discus figure, and lunate band of voluted nozzle. Abraded on rounded edge of nozzle, on the bands and scrolls of volutes, around the discus rim and part of discus figure near the rim, and the encompassing area where the nozzle joins the base. Deep, broad, circular body with plain surface and rounded sides. Narrow shoulder slopes genty up to groove surrounding deep, concave, circular discus. Deep, wide, rounded end nozzle with large circular wick hole, defined from body by volutes or obliquely sloping lunate band on each side with one scroll on each end of band, On flat tip of nozzle, between volutes and under rim groove, is a minute hole, Sides of body curve down to the flat raised base. Maker's signature placed centrally on base. Loeschcke Type IV or Bailey Type B. Loeschcke shoulder-form VIIb.

Function:
Used to burn oil to provide light or as a votive or funerary offering.

Decoration:
Rim: plain shoulder.
Discus: medium air hole below figural relief near rim groove. Stylised relief of victorious charioteer holding a large palm leaf; walking four horse team and chariot, to the left side of rim.
Base: impressed signature - [C] CLOS[V]C. Possibly part of the name of lamp maker, Closius Successus.

Tunisia, North Africa

Moulding

83.048

50-150 CE

31x79 mm

Terracotta

Purchased from B. A. Seaby Ltd, London, 1983.