Middle East, Carpet, Fragment. Carpet fragment, wool knotted pile on cotton warp and wool-silk-wool triple wefts, 'Vase Technique' three-plane lattice design of floral trellis on dark blue ground, possibly Kirman, Safavid Iran, 1600-1650

Fragment of a knotted pile carpet.
WARP: white cotton; Z4S; depressed; 30 threads per inch (122 per dm).
WEFT: (1) grey wool, Z2S and (2) white, occasionally red, silk, Z4S; 3 shoots (wool/silk/wool) after each row of knots; 18 knots per inch (66 per dm from a count of 33 per 5 cm).
PILE: wool; 16 colours: dark red, red, light red, orange, light orange, yellow, light yellow, dark green, green, light green, dark blue, blue, light blue, dark brown, brown, white; asymmetrical knot open to the right and tied around 2 threads; 270 knots per sq. inch (2013 per sq.dm).
SIDE FINISH: cut
END FINISH: cut
DESIGN: Field: dark blue ground traversed by angular white stems outlined in red, thicker blue stems outlined in yellow and thinner red ones, all three bearing composite blossoms and palmettes.
Date analysed: 23.8.94

Purchased from Antoine Brimo, via Kirkor Minassian, 12 University Street, London.
Other fragments originally all from the same carpet: Museum für Islamische Kunst in Berlin (Inv.I.8/72), an unidentified fragment also once in Friedrich Sarre’s private collection, the Textile Museum in Washington DC (Inv.R.33.6.5), and the Museum of Islamic Art in Cairo (Inv.3607). The original carpet has been estimated at 5m x 2.5m. For a diagram of the triple lattice system (in the Berlin fragment) see Beselin 2011: 167. The V&A fragment belongs on the lower right corner.

This is a fragment of a 17th century Persian carpet.
Diamond lattices softened by swirling stems form the underlying design structure on which colourful imaginary blossoms have been placed.

242-1896