SOUTH CAUCASUS, EARLY 19TH CENTURY

This rug is an early example of a small and highly collectable group of South Caucasian rugs. They have red fields with blue borders, and all contain two (or occasionally one) column of three stylised ‘tree’ motifs, with a column of white guls running between them. The design finds its origins in the ‘Garden’ carpets of Safavid Persia; the intersecting canals have dropped off the design, and what remains is the trees and the central fountains (Ian Bennett and Aziz Bassoul, Tapis du Caucase à travers trois collections libanaises privées, p.94, cat.23).

Further published examples include one with Eberhart Hermann (Von Konya bis Kokand: Seltene Orienttepiche III, Munich, n.d., p.74, cat.28), which shares with the present lot its small white dots in the field, while an example in an American collection is dated to AH 1290/1873-4 AD (Harold M Keshishian (ed.), The Treasure of the Caucasus, Washington DC, 1993, pl.5). The present lot, however, differs from those examples in its sparse drawing which lends it a more archaic feel. In his publication, James Burns suggests that the ‘Hakkari-Shanbo gul’ indicates that it was made by Kurdish weavers who had migrated from Hakkari to Shahsevan around the year 1800 (James D. Burns, Antique Carpets of Kurdistan: A Historical Legacy of Woven Art, London, 2002, p.227).

Examples offered at auction include one sold in these Rooms, 18 October 2001, lot 278, which achieved an auction record which stands to this day. More recent examples include one sold by Rippon Boswell Wiesbaden, 14 November 2003, lot 129, and another 27 June 2020, lot 49. Finally, an example in fairly worn condition but of a similar date to ours was sold by Grogan and Company, Boston MA, 29 January 2023, lot 595.