50 Fun Facts About Candle

Paraffin wax, the most common candle wax, is a by-product of what?

A Scottish chemist worked out how to distil paraffin wax from coal and oil shale in the 1850s, and it burned cleaner than tallow.

Roman dipped candles were made from beeswax and which animal product?

Tallow is rendered beef or mutton fat; it was cheap, smoky and smelled of the farmyard.

Some of the earliest Chinese candles, from before 200 BC, may have used which animal's fat?

Two thousand years later another whale product would give the West its brightest candles.

Which superior candle wax of the 18th century came from the head of the sperm whale?

A single whale's head could hold up to 1,900 litres of it, and Nantucket fortunes were built on the trade.

What does a candle wick use to draw melted wax up into the flame?

The wax itself is the fuel; the wick just delivers it, which is why an untrimmed wick smokes.

Roughly what is the average temperature of a candle flame?

The hottest zone reaches around 1,400 C, hot enough to melt aluminium.

Who introduced the plaited (braided) wick in 1825, ending the chore of constantly trimming candles?

A braided wick soaked in mineral salts curls into the flame's edge and burns itself away.

Joseph Morgan's 1834 machine could mould roughly how many candles per hour?

Continuous production is what turned candles from a luxury into an everyday household item.

Which harder, brighter-burning substance did Chevreul and Gay-Lussac separate from animal fat in 1823?

Their 1825 patent produced candles that stood up in summer heat, and stearin is still blended into candles today.

Which Scottish chemist distilled paraffin wax from coal and oil shale in the mid-1850s?

His bluish-white wax burned clean with no smell, and 'Paraffin' Young became a very rich man.

The SI unit of luminous intensity is named after the candle; what is it called?

An ordinary wax candle gives out roughly one candela, and the unit grew out of the old 'candlepower'.

The Victorian unit 'candlepower' was defined by the light of a single pure candle made of what?

The Metropolitan Gas Act of 1860 wrote the whale-wax candle into British law.

Which English king is said to have measured time with six marked candles that each burned for four hours?

Each candle was 12 inches tall and marked every inch, so one inch of wax meant 20 minutes.

Al-Jazari's 1206 candle clock is the first known device to use which light-bulb-style fastening?

The earliest reference to candle clocks of any kind is a Chinese poem from AD 520.

Elton John's original 1973 'Candle in the Wind' was a tribute to whom?

Bernie Taupin rewrote it in 1997 for Diana, Princess of Wales, and Elton has performed that version in public only once.

Roughly how many copies has 'Candle in the Wind 1997', the best-selling single since charts began, sold?

It was released two weeks after Diana's death, and every royalty went to her charities.

Where did Elton John give his only public performance of 'Candle in the Wind 1997'?

He sang it at Diana's funeral on 6 September 1997 and vowed never to sing it again unless her sons asked.

Yankee Candle, America's largest candle maker, was founded in 1969 in which state?

Michael Kittredge started it in South Hadley; the flagship store in South Deerfield has a candle museum and a year-round Christmas village.

For how much did Jarden buy Yankee Candle in 2013?

Newell Rubbermaid then bought Jarden in 2015, folding the candle giant into Newell Brands.

The custom of candles on a birthday cake is traced to Kinderfest celebrations in which country?

A 1746 party for Count von Zinzendorf had a cake with one candle per year of his age and one in the middle.

According to tradition, a birthday wish comes true only if what happens?

One theory traces cake candles to Greeks honouring Artemis, though the link is unproven.

How many branches does a Hanukkah menorah have?

Eight hold the nightly lights and the ninth is the helper used to light the rest.

What is the helper candle on a Hanukkah menorah called?

It must sit on a different level from the eight main lights.

Candlemas, when churches bless the year's candles, falls on which date?

In many countries Christmas decorations traditionally stayed up until this day.

Which American folk holiday grew out of German Candlemas weather lore?

In the old country the shadow-caster was a hedgehog; Pennsylvania's Germans substituted a groundhog.

Michael Faraday's famous 1848 Christmas Lectures for young people took what as their subject?

He founded the Royal Institution's Christmas Lectures in 1825, and they are still given every year.

Candlestick charts were developed in the 18th century by traders in which commodity?

Munehisa Homma of Japan usually gets the credit; Steve Nison brought the charts to the West in 1991.

The candlestick is one of the six original weapons in which 1949 board game?

Anthony E. Pratt's game gave it a dagger, lead piping, revolver, rope and spanner for company.

In which US state was candlepin bowling, with its tall thin pins, invented in 1880?

Justin White's Worcester game gives three balls a frame, and nobody has ever bowled a sanctioned 300; the record is 245.

Which Pacific fish is nicknamed the candlefish because a dried one can be lit like a candle?

Up to 15 percent of its body weight is fat at spawning time; the trade in its oil created the 'grease trails' of the Northwest.

Karl Duncker's 'candle problem' asks you to fix a candle to a wall using matches and a box of what?

The trick is to see the box as a shelf, not just a container; failing to do so is called functional fixedness.

What did Glucksberg's 1962 version of the candle problem find about offering cash prizes?

Pressure narrows thinking; once the tacks were tipped out of the box, almost everyone solved it.

What does a Roman candle firework do?

They are banned in Finland, the Netherlands and a dozen US states because of a tendency to malfunction.

On 13 December, girls in Sweden wear a crown of candles in honour of which martyr?

She wears a white robe and red sash and serves saffron lussekatter buns for breakfast.

How many grains of incense are pressed into a Paschal candle, representing Christ's wounds?

It is lit from the new fire at the Easter Vigil and marked with a cross, alpha and omega and the year.

On an Advent wreath, what colour is the candle lit on Gaudete Sunday?

The other three Sundays get violet, and a fifth white Christ candle sometimes sits in the centre.

Johann Hinrich Wichern's first Advent wreath of 1839 was made from what?

He fixed 24 small red candles and four large white ones to it so the children in his mission could count down to Christmas.

The Kwanzaa candle holder, which carries one black, three red and three green candles, is called what?

Maulana Karenga created the holiday in 1966; each candle stands for one of seven principles.

Which poet's 1920 poem 'First Fig' popularised the image of a candle burning at both ends?

It opened her collection A Few Figs from Thistles, a scandal in its day for its frankness about female desire.

Before electric lights, how were candles typically fixed to Christmas trees?

Clip-on candleholders only arrived around 1890.

Who lit the first electrically illuminated Christmas tree, in New York in December 1882?

Edison's associate hand-wired 80 red, white and blue bulbs the size of walnuts.

What has research shown the residue from 'ear candling' actually to be?

The FDA warned in 2007 that the practice risks burns and middle-ear damage and removes nothing.

From 1990 to 2019, an annual June 4 vigil in Hong Kong's Victoria Park remembered the victims of what?

A candlelight vigil is, by definition, an assembly of people carrying candles after sunset to pray, protest or mourn.

The word 'chandler' originally meant a maker or seller of candles; what does a ship's chandler sell?

Chandlers who stocked candles, oil, soap and paint were natural suppliers of ships' stores, and the name stuck.

Beeswax candles in medieval Europe were what?

Ordinary households made do with smoky tallow; wax was for altars and the wealthy.

The word 'candle' descends from the Latin candēla, itself from a verb meaning what?

It reached English via Old English candel and Anglo-Norman candele.

Which zone of a candle flame is the hottest, at around 1,400 °C?

The bright yellow zone is the most luminous but only about 1,200 °C, since it is starved of oxygen.

What mainly determines the height of a candle flame?

That is why a tealight, with its very thin wick, gives such a small flame.

Roughly how much light does a typical modern paraffin candle give out?

That works out to about 0.16 lumens per watt, nearly a hundred times less efficient than an incandescent bulb.

What metal was formerly used in wick cores to keep them upright, raising health concerns until the 1970s?

Zinc and zinc alloys are now the industry standard for metal-cored wicks.