Tuesday, December 20, 2011

Object of the Day, Museum Edition: An Eighteenth Century Hanukkah Lamp


The Victoria & Albert Museum

Made in the Netherlands in the Eighteenth Century, this brass Hanukkah lamp features the requisite eight lights. Its back-plate is cast and pierced and surmounted by a Star of David with a Hebrew inscription which reads: “For the commandment is a lamp and the Torah a light.”

This would have served as a menorah at Hanukkah--the eight-day Jewish Festival of Lights which celebrates the victory of Judas Maccabeus over the Syrian king Antiochus Epiphanes.

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