Pieces of a Puzzle: Classical Persian Carpet Fragments
Pieces of a Puzzle: Classical Persian Carpet Fragments
Classical Persian carpets of the 16th and 17th centuries have long been appreciated for their spectacular beauty and fine craftsmanship, although their development and classification have been poorly understood. Only in recent decades, as scholars began to analyze specific types of classical Persian rugs, have the pieces of the puzzle begun to fall into place. This exhibition presents nine examples of one of these types, named after the historic Persian province of Khorasan. This is the first exhibition to focus on classical Khorasan carpets. The three principal surviving fragments of one spectacular 16th-century Khorasan rug are reunited in this exhibition from three different collections. These pieces also fit together like a puzzle, allowing us to glimpse the grand scale of the original carpet. Despite their fragmentary nature, the Khorasan carpets on view retain their delicate beauty and can reveal much about the complete rugs and about classical Persian carpets as a whole.
Daniel Walker
Exhibition Curator and Textile Museum Director
The exhibition was on view at The Textile Museum from September 1, 2006 to January 7, 2007.
That presentation was made possible in part by:
Persepolis Foundation Patti Cadby Birch Alavi Foundation
For more information, read Daniel Walker's article "Carpets of Khorasan" in HALI magazine, no. 149, November-December 2006. All carpet structural analyses by D. Walker.
Khorasan
The province of Khorasan has long been renowned for its carpets. Khorasan today is the northeastern province of Iran, but, under the Persian Safavid dynasty in the 16th and 17th centuries, it also encompassed the cities of Merv in modern-day Turkmenistan and Herat in modern-day Afghanistan. Travelers in that era remarked upon the fine Khorasan carpets sold in the Persian Gulf port of Hormuz and in one of the main caravansaries in Isfahan. Cities in Khorasan, such as Sabzavar, Herat, Mashhad, Dorokhsh, and Sarakhs, are also cited as sources of fine carpets. Herat and Mashhad, in particular, are associated with specific types of carpets, but it is not clear exactly where these or any Khorasan carpets were made. Some of these cities may have been commercial centers where carpets were sold, rather than carpet-weaving centers.
Technique
Classical Khorasan carpets are characterized by superior wool and dyes; a broad color palette including blue-green, orange, and a bluish-red; exquisite drawing; and distinctive knotting variations. Although carpet patterns traveled from region to region, weaving techniques, choice of materials, and secondary elements of design often remained constant in one place and are therefore more reliable in identifying the origin of a particular carpet.
Many Persian carpets use an asymmetrical knot to secure the pile yarns that protrude from the surface and create the pattern. In Khorasan carpets, these knots are usually wrapped around four warp yarns rather than the usual two warps. This knotting variation is known as jufti, or paired or double, knotting. The knots in Khorasan carpets are also often offset, or staggered, row by row. This knotting variation may be a way of saving time and labor, although classical Khorasan carpets are so finely woven that this seems unlikely. Jufti knotting also could be simply a matter of longstanding local tradition, however it originated.
Design
Many of the field patterns found in classical Khorasan rugs also appear in other types of Persian carpets from that era. The compartment, tree, sickle-leaf, and various lattice patterns can all be found in other major carpet groups. Even the distinctive pattern of so-called Portugese carpets, named for the European-style sailing vessels and costume of the human figures in the corners of the fields, is also found in carpets from northwestern Iran. Identified only as recently as Khorasan production, the "Portugese" carpets are unusual among Khorasan pieces in surviving mostly in complete form; most classical rugs from Khorasan survive only as fragments.
Pattern is thus not as useful for identifying the specific origin of a carpet as other features, such as secondary elements of design, weaving techniques, choice of materials, and colors. In addition to jufti and offset knotting, classical Khorasan carpets often feature red outlining of pattern elements; a bluish red color usually associated with lac, an insect dye from India, along with the orangish madder red found in most other types of Persian carpets; and blue-green and orange hues in secondary design elements.
Carpets known to have been woven in Khorasan in the late 19th and 20th centuries exhibit many of the same design and technical features as the earlier Khorasan rugs, thus establishing a rare direct link connecting classical and more recent production in one area.
