In : L. Chrzanovski (dir.), Lychnological Acts 1.

Actes du 1er Congrès international d’études sur le luminaire antique (Nyon-Genève,

29.IX - 4.X.2003) (Monogr. Instrumentum, 31), Montagnac 2005.

Roman Lamps
discovered in Romula
(pl. 119)

Mircea Negru,
Alexandru Ba@descu

Romula was a Roman town placed at 60 Km to the
north of the Lower Danube. It was the biggest city, and
also the most important pottery production center and mar-
ket from Dacia Inferior (Malvensis).
These bellow presented lamps were discovered in the
archaeological research that has been carried out by
Cristian Vla@descu, in the place called the Central Fort of
Romula. They could be inserted in six groups.
Bailey Type K/Loeschcke Type VIII (no. 1)
Circular body with a long rounded nozzle. The handle is
missing. The narrow rounded shoulder is separated from
concave by a broad, inward-sloping moulded rim. The
small discus has some rings. The lamps stand on a base-
ring. The fine paste has brick-yellowish color covered with
a brown slip1.
Similar samples were found at Callatis2 in Moesia
Inferior, and Alexandria or Fayum in Egypt3. Last sample
was dated in the second and third quarters of the first cen-
tury AD4. Based on the type of the handle we suppose a
Black Sea shore origin.
Loeschcke Type VIII/Deneauve Types
VIIA and VIIC/Bailey Type P /Iconomu
Type XXIV (no. 2)
First group of lamps contains one sample. It has a cir-
cular body and the nozzle is missing. The shoulder is roun-
ded and undecorated. The concave disc is decorated with a
rosette. It has a tubular handle. It stands on slightly, circu-
lar bases, flat bellow. The paste is fine and has yellowish
color.
Similar lamps were found at Tomis5 in Moesia Inferior,
at Carthage in Africa and other places from Roman
Empire.This kind of lamps were dated from the first two
decades of the 1st century AD to the first half of the 2nd
century AD6, or in late half of 1st and first half of 2nd cen-
tury AD7.
Ones of the production centers were identified in the
Central Italy8, but we cannot exclude other ones. These
lamps were replaced by the North Italian Firmalampen.
Deneauve Type VF/Iványi Type
XXXIV/Loeschcke Type XX (no. 3)
The lamps has an oval shape with two nozzles, one is
missing. Long concave disc, decorated with impressed cir-
cles on the shoulder and four on the disc. The fine paste
has brick-orange color.
Similar samples were discovered in Pannonia9, and in
Carthage10. They were dated in 1st and 2nd centuries AD at
Carthage and at beginning of 2nd century AD in Pannonia.
These lamps are similar Loeschcke Type XX bronze and
terracota lamps and also to terracota imitations of Iványi
XXXIV type of bronze lamps with volutes11.

1-Tudor 1968, 88-89, Fig. 22:9.

2- Iconomu 1967, p. 153, no. 797, Fig. 201.
3- Bailey 1980, p. 250, type K, Q 1115 EA.
4- Ibidem, 249-250.
5- Iconomu 1967, 125-126, type XXIV, no. 651, Fig. 141.
6- Bailey 1980, p. 315.
7- Deneauve 1969, p. 165, nos. 796-797.
8- Bailey 1980, 314-315.
9- Iványi 1935, 25, 305, pl. LXV:1-3, nos. 4363-4365.
10- Deneauve 1969, p. 158, no. 638.
11- Iványi 1935, p. 23.

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 Mircea Negru, Alexandru Ba@descu

Loeschcke dated the bronze lamps in the latter of the 1st
century AD12, and the terracota imitations in the 2nd century
AD13.
Loeschcke Type V/Deneauve Type
VD/Iconomu Type XI/Iványi Type VI
(nos. 4-6) Loeschke
The volute-lamps with rounded nozzles. The wide,
rounded shoulder is separated from the small, concave dis-
XVII/Bailey Type N (nos. 7-14)
cus by a simple moulded rim. On the upper shoulder radia-
ting from the rim, is a series of impressed lines. A sample
has no decoration on the shoulder (6). They stand on sligh-
tly base ring and pierced ring-handle, formed in the mould
(nos. 4-6). The paste is fine and has light-brick (4, 6) or
red-orange (6) color.
Similar decorated samples were found at Tomis14 in
Moesia Inferior, in Pannonia15, and other Roman sites.
This kind of lamps was dated at Tomis from the late half of
the 1st to the 2nd century AD and, in the Hadrianic Period
at Carthage16. Donald Bailey dated this kind of lamps from
the late first into the first third of the 2nd century AD17 and
Dora Iványi in latter of the 1st and the beginning of the 2nd
century AD18.
A similar decoration is on a Firmalampen of Loeschcke
IX Type discovered in Pannonia19 and dated from the
beginning of 1st to the end of 2nd century AD.
Some simple undecorated lamps were discovered at
Ulpia Traiana Sarmizegetusa in Dacia. There they were
dated at the end of 3rd and beginning of 4th century20, and
in 4th-6th centuries21. Also, some similar decorated lamps
were found at (4-5) Tomis in archaeological contexts of the
3rd and 4th centuries AD22.
Even this kind of lamps was produced between late of
1st and 6th century AD, those from Romula may be dated
more probably in the 2nd century AD and less in the first
half of the 3rd century AD. No other archaeological mate-
rial can support a latter chronology in this case.
This kind of lamps was produced in the Central Italy23,
but also it seems to maintain a Hellenistic tradition by
Constantin Iconomu opinion23.
Type X/Iványi Type
They have a circular, bowl-shaped body with rounded
shoulders, adorned with 2 or 3 lugs, and with a raised rim
round a small, flat discus. The nozzle groove is a channel,
with approximate parallel sides. Some have handles, other
ones not. Some of lamps are signed within their bases with
relief letters. The marks are CASSI, FAVOR/F, FORTIS and
OCTAVI. The stamped OCTAVI lamps was decorated with
a wreath and palm branch bellow. The paste is brick or
light-brick color (7, 8, 10, 11, 14) covered with red slip (8,
10, 11, 14), or yellowish (6, 13) and brick-yellowish color
(12).
Made in North of Italy, Firmalampen were exported to
many parts of Roman Empire, and there – from Britain to
Bulgaria – they were copied by very many local lampma-
kers25. These lamps were made in a large number from the
first century to the middle of 3rd century AD26 and seldom
in the 4th century AD or latter27.
The lamps made in Italy have brick color and the same
color of slip. They are the lamps with OCTAVI and
FAVOR/F stamps and other ones of brick or light-brick
color (8, 10, 11, 14). Other ones of red-yellowish color
could be produced in Pannonia (6, 12, 13)28.

12- Loeschcke 1919, p. 325.

13- Ibidem, p. 340.
14- Iconomu 1967, p. 60, nos. 181, 185, Fig. 93.
15- Iványi 1935, p. 85, pl. XXV:3.
16- Deneauve 1969, p. 149, no. 624.
17- Bailey 1980, p. 198.
18- Iványi 1935, p. 12.
19- Ibidem, p. 16, pl. XLVIII:2.
20- Alicu 1994, Type XIII, p. 61, no. 1030 (with a coin from Galienus).
21- Ibidem, Type XXVII, p. 66, nos. 1074.
22- Iconomu 1967, p. 132, Fig. 155, no. 683.
23- Bailey 1980, p. 196.
24- Ibidem.
25- Ibidem, p. 275.
26- Ibidem; Alicu 1994, p. 56.
27- Iványi 1935, p. 33; Alicu 1994, p. 56.
28- Alicu 1994, 36-37.

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 Roman Lamps discovered in Romula

Iványi Type XXII/Alicu Type V (nos. 15- BIBLIOGRAPHY

16)
The lamps have a round body and the large mouth. The
disc is concave and the shoulder is rounded or oblique.
They have ring-handles. The paste is fine of grey (no. 15)
or brick color (16).
Similar lamps were found in Dacia29, in the neighbou-
ring provinces Thracia30, Pannonia31 and other Roman
provinces. These lamps have been dated between the
second half of the 2nd century AD and the beginning of the
4th century AD32.
Conclusions
The presented lamps could be dated in the first half of
second century AD (nos. 1-6), from the second century AD
to the middle of third (nos. 7-14) and from the middle of
the second century AD to the middle of the third (nos. 15-
16).
Even the main part of the archaeological material and
scientific information from the Central Fort of Romula is
still unpublished, it is sure that all archaeological material
may be dated from the beginning of the 2nd century AD to
the middle of the 3rd century AD33.
Alicu 1994 : D. Alicu, Opait1ele romane/Die Römischen Lampen.
Ulpia Traiana Sarmizegetusa, Bucures1ti 1994
Bailey 1980 : D. Bailey, A Catalogue of the Lamps in the British
Museum 2. Roman Lamps made in Italy, London 1980
Deneauve 1969 : J. Deneauve, Lampes de Carthage, Paris 1969
Iconomu 1967 : C. Iconomu, Opait1e greco-romane, Constanta
1967
Iványi 1935 : D. Iványi, Die Pannonischen Lampen, in DissPann,
II, 2, Budapest 1935
Kuzmanov 1981 : G. Kuzmanov, Za proizbodstvoto na glineni
lampi v Dolna Mizia I Trakia (I-IV v.), Archeologia 23/1-2
(1981), Sofia, 10-20
Loeschcke 1919 : S. Loeschcke, Lampen aus Vindonissa, Zürich,
1919
Negru 1996 : M. Negru, Some aspects of the lamps discovered in
the Roman forts of Muntenia, Acta Rei Cretariae 33 (1996),
Abingdon, 75-80
Petru 1972 : S. Petru, Emonske necropole, Ljubljana 1972
Tudor 1968 : D. Tudor, Oltenia romana@, 3rd ed., Bucures1ti, 1978.
Vikic!-Belanc&ic! 1975 : B. Vikic!-Belanc&ic!, Anticke svjietilike u
Arheoloskom muzeiu u Zagrebu, Vjesnik Arheologiceski Muzei,
Zagreb 9 (1975), 49-160
Vla@descu 1986 : C. Vladescu, Fortificatiile romane din Dacia
Inferior, Craiova 1986

29- Alicu 1994, 46-47, nos. 41-42; Negru 1996, p. 76, Fig. 2:3.
30- Kuzmanov 1981, p. 17, Fig. 6.
31- Siscia: Vikic!-Belanc&ic! 1975, p. 146, no. 1072, pl. 43:6; Mitrovica: ibidem, p. 147, no. 1074, pls. 43:7; 49:2; - Intercisa: Iványi 1935, p. 289, no.
4123, pl. LVI:7; - Emona: Petru 1972, p. 135, 104:6.
32- Iványi 1935, p. 20; Vikic!-Belanc&ic! 1975, p. 62.
33- Vla@descu 1986, 35-40.

— 255 —
 Mircea Negru, Alexandru Badescu
Roman Lamps discovered in Romula

Fig. 1- Roman Dacia.

Fig. 3, 10-16 - Roman lamps discovered in Romula.

Fig. 2, 1-9 - Roman lamps discovered in Romula

— pl. 119 —