# Edison is granted U.S. Patent 223,898 for an electric lamp

Date: 1880

## The fact

On 27 January 1880 the United States issued Patent 223,898 to [Edison](/people/thomas-edison) for an electric lamp using a carbon filament in a high-vacuum glass globe. Joseph Swan’s British work is contemporaneous. The U.S. patent is this Fact.

Patent 223,898 for an electric lamp (1880-01-27).

## Context

Incandescent priority is contested in Britain and the United States. A high-resistance filament that could run in parallel on a distribution system is the system-relevant claim. Litigation with Swan later produced a joint British company.

Thomas Edison is not the sole author of every later object, law, or museum label that uses the name. Shared work with courts, excavators, printers, spouses, officials, and later states does not erase a documented role, and it does not make an ancient person the signer of a twentieth-century statute.

## Evidence and sources

The patent text is official. Smithsonian electrical collections and Britannica independently describe the 1879–80 lamp work.

Official or archival record: U.S. Patent 223,898 — Electric Lamp (1880) (https://patents.google.com/patent/US223898A; United States Patent and Trademark Office / Google Patents).

## Significance

High confidence on the U.S. patent; medium on uniqueness against Swan.

Swan is not a rumour. He is a named independent inventor. Store the U.S. patent without erasing him.

## What is established and what is not

Established: U.S. Patent 223,898 on 27 January 1880. Not established: that Edison uniquely invented incandescent light, or that indoor air quality instantly improved.

What would change the picture: a contradictory original with a different date or name, or a measured series that can be argued, with lag and alternatives, as a consequence of this instrument rather than of later institutions.

The date is the date of this instrument, not a licence to back-date every later harm or benefit.
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## People

- Thomas Edison: https://factrail.ai/people/thomas-edison

## Drivers

- Energy Security: https://factrail.ai/drivers/energy-security

## Sources

- https://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/object/nmah_1198305
- https://patents.google.com/patent/US223898A

## Methodology

https://factrail.ai/methodology

Canonical: https://factrail.ai/facts/us-edison-lamp-patent-1880