Rush Lights

Making the bush candles a while back got me thinking about other forms of lighting used by our forefathers and of course the obvious rush lights spring to mind so I had a go making a few

I cut some rushes and peeled them leaving only about 1/6th of the skin for strength, then dipped some in melted candlewax and some in beef dripping

Both worked very well, the beef dripping one giving off a little more smoke and the candlewax one made the rushes very brittle and easily broke when it hardened, still it worked well although burn time was less than 7 minutes, the beef one is shown above.