CENTRAL ANATOLIA, 18TH CENTURY

This prayer rug is part of a well-known group of central Anatolian rugs whose double-storey architectural design resting upon slender coupled-columns enclosed within a golden yellow border is closely linked with earlier 'Transylvanian' rugs and was a design that proved so popular that it continued to be woven until the 19th century. A late 17th/early 18th century prayer rug discovered by Robert Pinner and Nejat Diyarbekirli in the mosque in Aksaray in 1986, has very similar colouration and design to the present lot but with narrower proportions, more squat columns and more elongated serrated leaves in the prayer spandrels. A further prayer rug was found in Aksaray, devoid of columns but with the same saturated colour palette suggesting that both were woven in the same village and possibly on the same loom (N.Diyarbekirli and R. Pinner, 'Four Rugs in Aksaray' HALI, Issue 39, pp.29-31). Other examples include a prayer rug in the Vakiflar Museum (inv.no.E-17) and a rug sold in The Bernheimer Collection, Christie's London, 14 February 1996, lot 144.