EAST TURKESTAN, CENTRAL ASIA, LATE 18TH/EARLY 19TH CENTURY

The use of blue cotton wefts, the restrained elegance of the design and minimal use of yellow, which can only be seen in the T-meander inner border, distinguish this carpet as having been woven in Yarkand in the Tarim Basin in East Turkestan. The design of fruiting pomegranate branches appears on a series of early (105 AD) wood carvings which were excavated from the ruins of Niya, once a major commercial center on the Silk Road on the southern edge of the Tarim Basin. It also appears frequently in religious Christian works as well as central Asian textiles, (Hans Bidder, Carpets from Eastern Turkestan, Tubingen, 1979, pp.49-53).

While some carpets display a single vase at one or both ends of the carpet, as seen in the proceeding lot in the current sale, the present carpet has two vases descending from each end issuing fruiting branches which divide the field into bi-lateral symmetrical quadrants. An indigo ground Yarkand carpet of 'Pomegranate' design, but with a 'T' meander rather than the present flowerhead main border, sold in these Rooms, 27 October 2022, lot 211. For a virtually identical example woven in silk but with the ‘Pomegranate-Vase' design set against an ice-blue ground, see E. Herrmann, Von Uschak bis Yarkand, Seltene Orientteppiche aus vier Jahrhunderten, Munich, 1979, No. 111, pg.157.