Hanukkah Lamp

German pewter lamps all have the same basic form: a backplate, a shelf at midpoint which holds a removable row of oil containers, a deep base to catch any oil dripped, and sidepieces. Although they were meant to stand, pierced holes in the backplates could have been used for suspension near the doorway during the holiday. The engraved decoration, like that on much of German pewter, is executed in a technique called wriggle-work, in which the lines are made up of zigzags.
This lamp type with two angels curving around the backplate is one of the only pewter groups that has cast relief decoration. Two dolphin-head spouts act as gargoyles to funnel off any precious oil and collect it in a miniature pail that would have hung from their mouths. The Hebrew initials engraved on the lamp most likely represent the names of the owners, probably a married couple. The custom of marking secular and ritual pewter in this way began as early as the sixteenth century, when pewter was such a highly desirable commodity that it was often stolen and sold back to the pewtersmith to melt down for raw material. These initials were engraved either by the pewterer or the owner.
In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, there was a lively industry in reproductions of antique pewter in Germany, part of the historismus, or revival, movement that characterized decorative arts in that period. Manufacturers either used old molds, made exact copies, or created their own pieces in antique styles. The angel lamp was copied by at least one firm, that of August Weygang in Öhringen, active from 1885 to 1946.