SOUTH PERSIA, CIRCA 1870

A small number of Qashqai rugs were woven using extraordinarily fine materials and dyes. Even among those the present rug is spectacular in its colouring, wool and drawing. A rug in the McCoy Jones Collection, now in the M.H. de Young Museum, san Francisco, with similar field design but smaller border, is inscribed with the name of the patron, Husayn Quli Khan b. Jani Khan (Hali, 25, January 1985, pl.4, p.18). These names can be identified with known tribal chieftains and thus enable it to be dated to the early nineteenth century. A clearly later and less refined rug of the same field design is dated to 1865 (James Opie, Tribal Rugs of Southern Persia, Oregon, 1981, pp.82-3). A similar rug to the McCoy Jones example was offered at Sotheby's London 15 October 1997, lot 37, while another more recently at the same saleroom sold on 27 April 2005, lot 68. The last rug is the only comparable one to have the same yellow ground seen here. But it was also considerably smaller than the present rug. And all the other rugs have a much smaller border than our example. The present carpet has an entire field and border design that is almost exactly the same as can be found in the most impressive carpets woven in Khorassan and Karabagh at the end of the eighteenth century (see for example a rug sold in these Rooms from the Jim Burns Collection, 18 October 2001, lot 249; or lot 220 in this sale).