Early Transcaucasian Carpet Fragment

72 x 63 cm (2' 4" x 2' 1")
Caucasus, 17th century
Condition: fragment, sewn on fabric
Published: "Weise Collection - Ambassadors from the Orient", Roland Weise, 2019, page 26
Warp: wool, weft: wool, pile: wool

The group of so-called "Golden Triangle" carpets is one of the most fascinating of all, as it includes so many unusual pieces. This is due, on the one hand, to the influence of regions as diverse as Persia, the Caucasus, and Eastern Anatolia, and on the other hand, to the unique artistic style of ethnic groups that have not yet been precisely identified.
In this fragment, wonderful colors combine with a complex field design to form a small work of art. The octagonal and star border is borrowed from the Safavid style but displays a color palette and design all its own. The field, on the other hand, draws on Azerbaijani embroidery. The patterns of some of these embroideries, in turn, trace back to tile patterns in Persian art.
See also "Stars of the Caucasus," pages 179, 187, and 191: The embroideries depicted there also feature octagons with stars arranged in a tile-like pattern, connected by cartouches. In contrast to the aforementioned silk embroideries, our carpet is rendered in entirely different, early Caucasian colors and is significantly more abstract than the embroideries.
Many of these fragments were discovered in Tibet in the 1980s and 1990s, and the present piece was once reused there as half of a saddle cover.

Estimate: € 10000 - 15000