NORTH WEST PERSIA, CIRCA 1920

The Petag workshop (Persische Teppiche A.G.), was a German initiative founded in Berlin in 1911. Guided by the scholar Heinrich Jacoby, author of “Eine Sammlung Orientalischer Teppiche”, Berlin, 1923, amongst other works, a large workshop was opened in Tabriz which produced high quality carpets in order to combat the decline in quality encountered as a result of the mass production of the late 19th century. The carpets are identified by the use of a particularly high quality wool, natural vegetal dyes and their distinctive 'signature' formed of three çintamani roundels generally located in the far corner of the field or border pattern, or as in the present lot, within the far outer guard stripe. The design, including the inscription cartouches, closely copies the Safavid 'Emperor's carpets' one of which is in the Museum für Angewandte Kunst in Vienna and its pair, sold to Duveen through Christie's in 1929, is now in the Metropolitan Museum, New York. A similar example woven in the Petag workshop, which had white cotton highlights within its design, was sold in these Rooms, 7 October 2010, lot 113 and a larger carpet of over seven meters was published by Franz Bausback, Alte und Antike Orientalishe Knupkunst, Mannheim, October 1980, p.64.