FIRE AS AN AGENT IN HUMAN CULTUEE 231 



from Kashmii". They are saucers of thin terra cotta pressed in on 

 opposite sides to form a handle by which the lamp may be grasped. 

 Another lamp from Srinagar, Kashmir, is napiform of red terra cotta 

 with spout. The wick channel is cut through the rim and the res- 

 ervoir is open above, as in the Turkestan lamps. This specimen is 

 decorated with incised triangles and the border is scalloped. The 

 native name is song. 



INDIA 



Some of the common lamps of India were procured by Henry 

 Balfour, of Oxford, from Mirzapur, India. The types are a round, 

 shallow, eathernware saucer with flared sides and the edge pinched 

 into a spout; and an oval earthernw^are lamp pressed in a form and 

 with sharp spout; and an oval eathernware saucer with flaring sides 

 continued at one end to a sharp spout. Another is a little copper 

 cup having four shallow grooves beaten in the sides for the wicks. 

 In southern India " earthernware saucers with a small peak or notch 

 for securing an oil. wick are used in houses, bazaars temples, etc., 

 usually placed in triangular niches in the walls. The same sort of 

 lamps are found in prehistoric graves. ** 



Sacred lamps are innumerable in India and of infinite variety. In 

 temple lamps ghi or clarified butter, not oil, is burned with wicks of 

 new cotton. If oil is used the til oil only is allowed. One lamp is 

 described as a cup on a foot with a long handle. To the cup is con- 

 nected a nagas-shaped head on which rest five small oil cups. In 

 another Devi holds five oil cups.^^ 



Some temple lamps of brass, with several wick notches around the 

 rim. Others consist of small brass saucers arranged on stands in di- 

 minishing circles. ^^ In the worship of Kali there are placed on each 

 corner of altar lamps consisting of five earthen pots, four of these 

 surrounding the fifth as the center. The latter is for incense, the 

 others for fight. *^ Sacred lamps are often mounted on elaborate metal 

 work stands. 



The simple lamp of Ceylon is a shallow saucer of earthenware, 



with a projection on the edge forming the wick spout and another 

 projection opposite forming a stub handle. Another simple lamp is 

 a shallow elliptic platter of brown composition like cement, neatly 

 made and with a wick spout at one end. 



Ceylon brass lamps have multiple wick channels, as those of India 

 described. Others have spouts longer than the lucerna and somewhat 

 resemble Flemish spout lamps. One lamp, probably recent, appears 

 to use gravity pressure on the wick. 



1* E. B. Tylor. Journ. Anthr. Inst., vol. 13, 1884, p. 356. 



IS Catalogue of Objects of Indian Art. South Kensington Museum, Tylor Collection, p. 285. 



» E. B. Tylor. Journ. Anthr. Inst., vol. 13, 1884, p. 356. 



«' Illustrated Catholic Missions, April, 1889. p. ISO. 



