The Tingle Factor Box

Heritage Hints - Tooth Powder

Mix 1 oz. prepared chalk, 8 drops pure carbolic, any scent to taste.

(Women's Missionary Association of the Presbyterian Church of New South Wales, Cookery Book of Good and Tried Receipts, circa 1910)

It's Like A Weird Candle! Roman Oil Lamps

Imagine, you're a child living in ancient Rome. You don't much like the dark, but luckily your family have plenty of lamps to light your villa, and plenty of servants to ensure that the flames are lit in any rooms you want to visit. You even have your own oil lamp in your bedroom, which sits a good distance from your bed (it wouldn't do to knock it over). Of course, oil is expensive, so when you have fallen asleep, it is the responsibility of one of your servants to make sure the flame is extinguished - your father would be very angry if the flame were to burn all night, wasting all that precious oil!

When I took these Roman Oil Lamps to show the children, they were quite confused by what they could possibly be. The children today are of course used to simply flicking a switch and having light, and oil lamps, even of a more modern style, are very unusual indeed. The children were intrigued to discover that these tiny lamps, which fit in the palm of my hand, were once used to light the ancient world. They were amazed that such a small object could have been so important - yet oil lamps were the main source of lighting for thousands of years.

In the ancient world, oil lamps were one of the most common household items and lamps made of stone and shell date back to the stone age! The lamps above date to the Roman era and are made of clay. Sometimes they were beautifully decorated too! They work with a wick which is fed through the spout into the body of the lamp. The big hole in the top is used to fill the lamp with oil and then the wick is lit. The wick would absorb the oil, allowing the oil to burn slowly. Modern wicks are made out of material and are a little bit like the cord in pajama pants. The Romans probably made their own wicks. The oils used by the Romans were usually made from plants, like olive oil. To learn more about Roman Oil Lamps, click here or to see lamps in the Powerhouse collection, click here. 

Lamps were used to light homes right through to the 20th century, though their design changed a lot over that time. More modern lamps were made of metal or ceramic and could be very pretty, like the one pictured below. They also had 'chimney's', or glass tubes, which helped to make the light of the flame brighter because the glass reflected it. If you would like to find out more about lamps, click here to visit the Braidwood Original Lamp Shop site.

If you have, or want to buy a lamp, remember - never use Citronella Oil inside. Use proper lamp oil as Citronella is toxic. Also, be careful as they get hot and they are a flame driven light - you don't want any accidents!

Roaming Roy Takes Stock At The Convict Stockade - Newcastle

This week, Roy decided he wanted to look back in time and revisit a site which has fascinated him for many years, the Convict Lumber Yard and Stockade in Newcastle. Newcastle is well known for its industrial past and heritage, and for convict settlement, but this site was one of the first to have been settled in the area, in 1801, which was less than 20 years after European colonisation of Australia! 

If you would like to visit the Newcastle Convict Stockade, which is also known as the Newcastle Lumber Yard, it is on Scott Street in Newcastle. The actual address is 98 Scott Street, and it's an interesting place to visit with plenty of places to sit and relax - you can even sit on one of the old convict 'buildings' which are today represented as a sculpture! The Convict Stockade is just opposite the Great Western Hotel in Newcastle, so it's also close to one of the popular accomodation options in Newcastle. 

Newcastle was, from 1801 until 1822, a place where convicts were sent if they had committed a second crime, as a type of punishment. The site of the lumber yard was first used by Convicts in 1801, and the life of convicts in Newcastle was hard and monotonous. In the lumber yard the convicts were mustered, or called into a specific area to check that no convicts had run away or gone missing, four times a day. Food rations were even less than convicts received in Sydney, and were not really enough to keep the convicts healthy. They worked hard and very long hours. On weekdays they were first mustered together at 5am, and their last muster was at 8pm. They truly worked from 'dawn till dusk'. On Saturdays they worked a half day and Church on Sundays was a must. 

Today, the Lumber Yard is truly a 'buried treasure'. There are lots of remains left from the time of the convicts on the site, including a drain, a kiln floor, a sump, a well, parts of the convict barracks, bricks from the collapsed hospital and brick paths. These remains are all still there, but you won't see them above ground, though the well has a clear covering over it so you can still see it. There are 'skeleton' sculptures showing where the remains and buildings once stood, so you can get a feel for the site, but the real remains are hidden below. So, how do we know they are there at all?

 

In 1987, and then in 1989 and 1992 the site of the Convict Lumber Yard was excavated (dug up) as part of archaeological investigations. In an archaeological excavation, the soil is carefully removed from a site, to allow experts to investigate what lies under the modern level. These types of investigations are done all over the world, and often there are lots of layers to investigate. You might think that archaeologists simply dig straight down to the layer they are interested in, finding out what they wanting to know without bothering about what happened in the layers above. This isn't usually the case though! Especially when investigations are being carried out on a site which has different histories, each is investigated one at a time, the findings are recorded and only then do the archaeologists move down to the next layer. This is particularly important in sites which date back for hundreds of years, like those in Europe or Egypt. Even more 'recent' sites, like the Lumber Yard are still carefully excavated, ensuring all the different periods and layers of occupation (people using the site) are found and recorded. There were signs of Aboriginal settlement, as well as the Convict occupation at the lumber yard site. There was also evidence and remains from the period when the site was used by the Railways. After the excavations were complete, the site was covered up again to protect it, from the weather and from people.  

 

Roy Creates Deliciously Chocolatey Jamaican Slice

 

This week, Roy was asked by a friend of his to create some sort of simple, finger food style dessert. Roy was thinking long and hard about what he could create and decided that some sort of really special, deluxe slice would be perfect. The question then was, what to make? What would be decadent enough for a dessert. Then, we remembered a recipe we had come across for a Jamaican Rum Slice which, at the time, we thought was too decadent for an every day slice. This seemed the perfect time to give it a try and the results were delicious. So this week, Roy Creates Deliciously Chocolatey Jamaican Slice.

You Will Need:

• 125 grams of butter
• 1 tablespoon of cocoa
• 1 cup of plain flour
• ½ a cup of icing sugar
• 1 can of condensed milk
• 1 tablespoon of rum
• 2 tablespoons more of cocoa
• ½ a cup of coconut
• ½ a cup of sultanas
• ½ a teaspoon of vanilla essence
• 125 grams of dark chocolate
• 30 grams of copha

Method:

• Preheat the oven to 180 degrees and line a 28 by 18 centimetre slice tin with baking paper
• Melt together the butter and 1 tablespoon of cocoa
• Soft together the flour and icing sugar

• Pour the sifted ingredients into the melted butter and mix to a soft dough
• Press the dough into the bottom of the tin and cook for 10 minutes. 

• While the base is cooking, put the condensed milk, rum, 2 tablespoons of cocoa, coconut, sultanas and vanilla into a saucepan and melt together until the cocoa has fully dissolved

• Pour the condensed milk mixture over the warm base and return to the oven for another 10 minutes or until caramelised
• Cool the slice in the tin

• When the slice is cold, melt the copha and chocolate together and spread over the slice. 
• Allow the chocolate topping to set before cutting the slice into squares. 
• Enjoy!

Beef Tea For Invalids And Sick People

Take a juicy slice off the top side of the round. Cut it finely on a board, removing skin and fat. Put it into a stone jar with its own weight of water; put the lid on the jar, and tie paper over it. Let it soak for an hour. Place it on the hob for 3 hours, and then for 1/2 an hour in the oven, or standing in a saucepan of boiling water. When cold, skim, and heat up as required. Good beef-tea should never be boiled. It ought not to jelly.

(Women's Missionary Association of the Presbyterian Church of New South Wales, Cookery Book of Good and Tried Receipts, circa 1910)