Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 2.djvu/509

 ii s. vin. DEC. 27, 1913.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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wanting as to whether candles were known before or after the use of lamps had become general. The candle seems to be mentioned as an old affair by Martial :

Nomina candelce nobis antiqua dederimt, Non ndrat parcos uncta lucerna patres.

('Ep.,' xiv.43.)

But here, again, the meaning may be torch (funale), which the old Romans would most probably call candela, from its shining qualities, as well as funale, in allusion to its manufacture.

The most valuable information on this point is to be obtained from a passage in Apuleius's 'Metam.,' iv., where, at a noise in the dead of night, the household runs in with " taedis, lucernis, sebaceis, cereis, et ceteris " (i.e., with torches of pine, lamps, tallow candles, and wax tapers). This is a decided proof that candles both of wax and tallow were used. They* were, however, at no time considered so respectable as the lamp. Compare Martial (' Apoph.,' 42):

Hie tibi nocturnes praestabit cereus ignes Subducta est puero iiamque lucerna tuo

an apology for giving his friend a wax light, as his footman has walked off with the lamp.

At Herculaneum a chandler's apparatus was found ; and in the British Museum there is a fragment of a huge candle found in Vaison, near Orange, and supposed to have been made about the first century B.C. Juvenal (iii. 287) also speaks of the " breve lumen candelae." The wick of such candles would probably be the pith of rushes (scirpus) rudely covered with crude wax or tallow, and rolled into shape. Candlesticks to hold these existed, having later on a spike to penetrate the butt of the candle. The name cande- labrum, however, was applied generally to the pillar on which the oil lamp was placed or from which it was suspended.

In the Middle Ages wax candles were made of various sizes, some exceedingly small, and others weighing as much as 50 Ib. In England, in the old Saxon time, the only candle iised was a lump of fat with a wick stuck in the middle, placed upon H piece of pointed wood called a condel- sticca or candel-stcef. In this period wax candles were not, as a rule, made by pro- fessional chandlers, and we find that the well- known candles of King Alfred were manu- factured by his- chaplains, who had to supply wax in sufficient quantity and to weigh it in such a manner that, w r hen there was so much of it in the scales as would equal the weight of seventy-two pence, six candles were to be made thereof, each of equal length, so that each candle might have

twelve divisions marked across it. Six of these candles, lighted in succession, burnt exactly twenty-four hours.* It seems, too r that previous to the invention of the clock,, the burning-time of wax candles of a definite- length and thickness, like the sand-glass,, served for the approximate determination of time.

Ducange says candles or candelarii were made and sold in the middle of the thirteenth century. The tallow chandler's trade is- mentioned as early as the reign of Edward I. At this time, when late hours had become more fashionable, cotton and thread were- substituted for rushes and reeds, and the- fat underwent some refining process.

" By the ancient laws of Wales, the candle-bearer to royalty was allowed a piece of candle as long as the breadth of his hand, and was entitled to the- f ragmen ts, and enjoyed the delectable privilege of claiming all the tops, on condition that he bit then* off,."t

Small wax tapers were fixed along the walls for lighting rooms, and were used in churches from the time of their erection, but were- considered, even by princes, as extremely costly. Tallow candles, candlesticks, and snuffers appear first to have become common- in the fifteenth century.

According to Gilbert White, rush-marc candles were made and used in Hampshire in 1775. A truly ancient form of candle is the rushlight, the Hampshire make of which is thus described :

"A small deal strip is stuck upright at right angles to a broader piece of wood, which acts as a firm basis. The upright board is furnished at the- top with a rude iron clamp, which holds the nislv dipped once or twice into grease. The rush is held at an angle of 30" to the basis, on which the ends rests, the ash dropping on the table."

A more primitive candlestick and light cannot be conceived. A duty on candles was imposed in 1709, and repealed in 1831.

Many quaint and obsolete customs were- connected with the candle, as " selling by candle," when the article bid for was knocked' down after a certain length had burnt. So Pepys (6 Nov., 1660) :

" To our office for the sale of two ships by an

inch of candle (the first time that ever I saw any- thing of this kind)."

Also " excommunication by candle " v. ' N.E.D.' quotation (a. 1300), ' Cursor M,,' " 17110. Curced in kirc ]>an sal )>ai be wid candil, boke, and bell " where the grace and time for penitence were adjudged by

English Chronicles,' p. 84.
 * Asser's 'Annals,' trans, from Bohn's 'Six Old:

t * Our English Home, its Early History and Progress,' p. 92, 2nd ed., 1861.