Candlestick

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Although common in Roman times, candlesticks of the socket variety were not seen again in Europe until the fourteenth century. The revival of this type might well have been due to the return of merchants of the wax trade from the East, where socket candlesticks are known to have existed as early as the thirteenth century. The sockets were usually left open as the sides to facilitate the removal of the candle ends in order to reuse the wax, an expensive commodity. The drip pan, which in pricket candlesticks was placed directly below the candle, has here been lowered and incorporated into the high circular base. The fifteenth-century tendency to embellish the stem in manifested here with the skill that so distinguished the metalworkers of the Lowlands.

Medieval Art and The Cloisters

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Museum's collection of medieval and Byzantine art is among the most comprehensive in the world. Displayed in both The Met Fifth Avenue and in the Museum's branch in northern Manhattan, The Met Cloisters, the collection encompasses the art of the Mediterranean and Europe from the fall of Rome in the fourth century to the beginning of the Renaissance in the early sixteenth century. It also includes pre-medieval European works of art created during the Bronze Age and early Iron Age.

Metropolitan Museum of Art