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Message: <blockquote data-quote="EzekielRaiden" data-source="post: 9702646" data-attributes="member: 6790260"><a href="https://roguish.wordpress.com/2021/01/25/an-overlooked-thieves-tool-the-dark-lantern/" target="_blank">A website, specifically geared toward the discussion of things related to TTRPGs, which shows museum pieces, historical documents, and other items displaying the use of lanterns of this type.</a>They were in use from at least the late 17th century up through the turn of the 20th century. Items we have been able to hold onto (which, naturally, few survive from the earliest periods) show that they could in fact be used while worn on the belt, and we have evidence that combat manuals suggested their use in combat. (But, as the website notes, this is at least slightly far-fetched unless already open and simply shone into the opponent's eyes, as you can't both hold the lantern and operate the shutter with just one hand.) One such dark lantern, which I will agree does not have a belt-attachment on it but does show that lanterns of this general type were in wide use, is specifically Guy Fawkes' lantern, the one he used when he attempted to blow up Parliament.As you can see from the historical advertisement for one of the lamps shown on that page, that specific lamp was designed to use whale oil or lard "exclusively"; presumably, lanterns made in the 16th to 17th century would have needed to rely on lard or other sources, as I don't think sperm whales were harvested in any meaningful quantity until the 19th century.So yeah. Functioning lamps, which we know for at least some periods were in fact worn (or at least wearable) on belts, did in fact exist at the very least by the early modern period, and may date back as far as the late Renaissance--perfectly in keeping with plenty of other social and technological elements of D&D.</blockquote>

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