Terracotta wick holder

Small perforated disc-shaped terracotta items have long been unearthed in excavations in the Near East, always in Byzantine or early Umayyad contexts. These finds were most often made near a basilica and, on one single occasion, in connection with a lamp shop or workshop.

These objects, conical or truncated-cone in profile or shaped like a hemispherical cap, 2 to 4.5 cm wide, vary in height but very rarely exceed 2 cm. Pierced at the top with a central hole, they are hand-modelled in common ware. Since they were linked to a particular type of glass lamp with a hemispherical reservoir and a tubular foot, their function as wick holders has been established.

But although they were particularly suited to these lamps, they could be used with other glass and clay lamps.