General Information

Late Byzantine Jerash lamps are the final mass-produced item (along with Jerash Bowls) made in the Gerasa Hippodrome Byzantine-era Workshop. The lamps have a flattened, slipper-shaped body, wide ovoid filling hole, broad decorated rim, and a vertical handle finished with three small flattened nodules. These evoke an animal’s head and ears, leading to the handles being described as zoomorphic. As Ina Kehrberg-Ostrasz has noted however, the nodules worked as carrying devices: one can hold the lamp horizontal by placing a thumb between the “ears” and wrapping two fingers around the “head” (Ostrasz and Kehrberg-Ostrasz 2020, pg. 364). She has also noted that the precise angle by which the “head” was attached may indicate whether the potter was right or left-handed.

Jerash/Gerasa (Jordan/Northern Highlands)