Fire pot is a container, usually
earthenware, for carrying fire. Fire pots have been used since prehistoric
times to transport fire from one place to another, for warmth while on the
move, for cooking, in religious ceremonies and even as weapons of war.
Campfire
Fire pots were vital to the development
of civilization. Once humans had learned to contain, control and sustain fires,
they had an invaluable tool for cooking food that would have otherwise not been
edible. Fire pots were also useful for sharpening spears, hollowing out canoes,
baking pottery, and many other tasks, such as staying warm.
At first, humans relied on natural
fires, caused by lightning strikes or other natural occurrences, to provide
them with a flame to start their own fires. Since natural fires are not very
common, humans learned how to make fires by igniting tinder from sparks caused
by striking stones together, or by creating friction using a bow drill.
Given the time-consuming nature of early
firestarting, humans eventually began to use earthenware vessels, or fire pots,
in which slow-burning fires could by kept alight indefinitely by using small
quantities of fuel. Nomadic people could carry these small fires with them,
using them to start larger fires for their evening camps.
Archaeologists found that fire pots were
being used 10,000, or more, years ago, according to finds during the 1936-37 dig
in Fells Cave , of which is located in the valley of the Rio Chico, not far
from the Strait of Magellan.
Semi-nomadic and sedentary people would
have made or acquired more advanced types of fire pots, as opposed to the fully
nomadic people who would have used more primitive types. Being more sedentary,
people were able to more effectively work with clay, and would have kilns to
bake the pottery in, instead of using the traditional fire-baking methods.
WarmthEdit
Portable fire pots have long been used
as a source of warmth.
Kangdi
A Kangdi is a traditional earthen fire pot from
Kashmir, used to warm the hands or feet. In Kashmir, in winter, people usually
wear a "Phiran" or long woolen gown over their normal dress. To keep
the inside of the Phiran warm, they sometimes use a Manann, a fire-pot made of
clay. But with no insulation on its clay handles, the Manann is inconvenient.
A Kangdi is an improved version of the
Manann, a semi-spherical clay pot enclosed in willow rushes, with handles also
made of willow rushes. The pot holds burning coals that stay warm throughout
the day. Throughout Kashmir in winter, it is common to see people with one hand
holding their Kangdi inside their Phiran, doing the daily chores with the
other.
Cooking
The fire pot was probably invented long
after people discovered the value of cooking over fire. Once fire-proof
containers became available, such as iron pots, it was natural to design fire
pots that both heated and supported the cooking vessel. Over time, these
developed into stoves, used both for cooking and heating.
Adogan
An earthenware fire-pot or indigenous
stove found in West Africa , notably in Ilora and Oyo, an Adogan has a flat
bottom with a carinated wall and an out-turned rim with three decorated lugs to
support the cooking pot. A U-shaped hole is cut in one side to allow air to
enter, and through which fuel is inserted.
Chinese Hot pot
Hot pot or huoguo (Simplified Chinese: 火锅)
is a traditional Chinese social meal. The literal Chinese translation is fire
pot, as huo means fire, while guo refers to pot. The Chinese hot pot consists
of a simmering metal pot of stock at the center of the dining table. While the
hot pot is kept simmering, thinly sliced ingredients are placed into the pot
and are cooked at the table. This type of cuisine is also referred to as
"steamboat". In Western cooking, the fondue is used in a similar way,
although usually with different ingredients.
Warfare
Small earthen pots filled with
combustibles were used as early thermal weapons during the classical and
medieval periods. Containers made at first from clay, later from cast iron,
known as 'carcasses', were launched by a siege engine, filled with pitch, Greek
fire or other incendiary mixtures. These fire pots could cause great damage to
besieged cities with largely wooden construction.
A description of how to make military
fire pots is given in Lucar, 1588, cited by Martin 1994:207-217
"Make great and small earthen
pottes which must be but half baked, and like unto the picture in the mergent .
. . . Fill every of those pottes halfe with grosse gunpowder pressed downe
harde, and with one of the five severall mixtures next following in this
Chapter, fill up the other half of those pottes: This done, cover the mouth of
every potte with a peece of canvasse bound hard about the mouth of the potte,
and well imbrued in melted brimstone. Also tie round about the middle of every
potte a packthreed, and then hang upon the same packthreed round about the
potte so many Gunmatches of a finger length as you wil, & when you wil
throe any of these pottes among enemies, light the same gun-matches that they
may so soone as the potte is broken with his fall uppon the ground, fire the
mixture of the potte. Or rather put fire to the mixture at the mouth of the
potte, & by so doing make the same to burn before you doe throe the potte
from you, because it is a better and more surer way than the other: I meane than
to fire the said mixture after the potte is broken with burning gunmatches.
Moreover this is to be noted, that the small pottes do serve for to be throne
out of one shippe into an other in fight uppon the sea, and that the great
pottes are to be used in service uppon the lande for the defence of townes,
fortes, walles, and gates, and to burne such things as the enemies shall throe
into ditches for to fill up the same ditches, and also to destroy enemies in
their trenches and campes"
By the mid-17th century, fire pots had
largely been replaced by shells filled with explosives, which may be seen as
the direct descendants of military fire pots.
Religion and the ArtsEdit
There is an element of mystery in fire,
which at times has led to fire worship. Fire pots have been used in religious
ceremonies for thousands of years .[5] It would be inappropriate, and probably
impossible, to cover all religious uses of fire pots in this article, but a few
examples are relevant.
Censers
A Censer is any type of vessel made for
burning incense. They range from simple earthenware bowls to intricately carved
silver or gold vessels, small table top objects a few centimetres tall to as
many as several metres high. In many cultures, burning incense has spiritual
and religious connotations, and this influences the design and decoration of
the censer.
Before a Buddhist tantric ritual, an
assisting monk may swing a censer or thurible as he passes to 'purify' the
room. This is a container usually made of metal that hangs form three chains.
Inside it, powdered incense that has been put on a smoldering bit of charcoal
burns slowly, and the smoke escapes through pierced openings in the closed lid.
One tradition says that during one of the Buddha's sermons a monk heedlessly
swatted a mosquito. The Tathagatha is said to have ordered that, in the future,
incense ought to be lit in order to keep the flies away, so that people could
more easily concentrate on Dharma teachings, but also to prevent the needless
taking of lives.
Censers are used in the Roman Catholic,
Anglo-Catholic, Old Catholic and Eastern Orthodox sects of the Christian
religion during important rituals such as benedictions, processions and
important masses.
Early Jewish Symbol of God
In Genesis 15, a chapter of the Bible ,
God instructs Abraham to cut a heifer, a she goat, a ram, a turtledove, and a
young pigeon into halves. When it got dark, "a smoking fire pot and a
flaming torch passed between the pieces", and later God made a covenant
with Abraham granting him and his heirs extensive lands between the River of
Egypt (either the Nile or the Wadi el Arish in the Sinai) and the Euphrates.
Texts from Mari in northern Mesopotamia
from about the same period say that parties entering into a covenant would seal
the agreement by cutting a donkey in half and then walking between the severed
pieces. One interpretation of the ceremony described in Genesis 15 is that God
made an unconditional covenant when God alone (symbolized by the fire pot, or
the fire in it) passed between the two halves of the slaughtered animals.
Japanese Kodo Ceremony
Kōdō (香道
- Way of Fragrance) is the Japanese art of appreciating incense, and involves
using incense within a structure of codified conduct. Participants sit near one
another and take turns smelling incense from a censer as they pass it around
the group. Participants comment on and make observations about the incense, and
play games to guess the incense material.
Sakthi Karagam
Sakthi Karagam is a dance performed in
Tamil Nadu with a fire pot on the head in the Mariamman or Durga temple
rituals. Today it is danced with a pot decorated with flowers on the head and
is known as 'Aatta Karagam' and symbolises joy and merriment. In earlier times,
the clay pot, or Karagam, was considered the residence of the local deity
during the festival ,[8] which played a crucial role in community bonding. It
is not clear whether the pot ever contained fire, or was so named because it
was carried over fire by fire walkers.
Descendants of the Fire Pot
Although the fire pot and its ancestor
the fire pit are still in use in their original forms, successive technical
refinements have led to many modern descendants whose origin in the simple clay
container might be hard to guess. Some have been driven by the need to adapt to
new fuels, such as charcoal, oil, coal, coke, kerosene, propane, electricity
and microwaves. Others have been made possible through discovery of new
materials such as iron, bronze, ceramics and asbestos. Always the motive would
have been to improve the design, to make a device for managing fire that was
cheaper, more robust, more convenient, more capable of meeting new demands.
Often improvements made for industrial purposes found their way into improved
cooking devices, and vice versa.
An incomplete list of fire pot
descendants includes:
Brazier: A standing or hanging metal
bowl or box containing the fire, with perforations for ventilation. A Hibachi
is a type of brazier.
Stove: An enclosed space containing the
fire, with dampers and regulators to adjust the draft and thus control the
heat. A stove allows for cleaner, hotter and more efficient use of fuel than a
fire pot or brazier.
Oven: An enclosed compartment of a
stove, separate from the fire, used for heating, baking or drying. Ovens may
have their origin in the practice of enclosing food in clay or leaves before
placing it in the fire, still used in Kalua, the traditional cuisine of Hawaii.
Ovens make it practical to cook slowly, heating the food throughout, and are
the basis of many types of cuisine. Ovens enable pottery and today are used in
many industrial processes.
Boiler: A closed vessel in which water
is heated. The discovery that boilers could build up explosive pressure if too
well sealed led to the invention of the steam engine, a pivotal technology in
the Industrial Revolution.
Barbecue: A device for cooking on a
grill over a box containing burning wood, charcoal or, more recently, propane
or natural gas.
