SOUTH PERSIA, CIRCA 1870

The knot count measures approximately 8V x 8H knots per sq. cm.

The ‘niche and millefleurs’ design of this prayer rug takes its cue from earlier Mughal pashmina carpets, such as the examples in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, and in the Österreichisches Museum für Angewandte Kunst, Vienna (Daniel Walker, Flowers Underfoot: Indian carpets of the Mughal era, New York, 1997, pp.131-2). A pair of cypress trees beneath spandrels in the top half create a niche which frames a vase overflowing with flowers. Probably woven in Kashmir in the eighteenth century, those carpets were in turn inspired by the ‘niche-and-flower’ carpets which date from the reign of Shah Jahan (r.1628-58).

The present lot attests to the transmission of this design from India to Persia, here taken up by weavers from the semi-nomadic Qashqa’i confederation in Fars province. The richness of colour, the quality of wool and the finely spun silk wefts, which allow for a smoother weave on the reverse, are all indicative characteristics of the Kashkuli tribe which were part of the Qashqai confederacy (James Opie, Tribal Rugs of Southern Persia, Portland, 1981, p.16).

The cartoon, here woven with a powder-blue field and a rust-orange mihrab, is found woven in other colour combinations featuring, green, red, white and yellow grounds. A closely related silk-wefted Qashqai prayer rug with the same colour palette is published by James D. Burns, Visions of Nature: The Antique Weavings of Persia, New York, 2010, p.249, fig.85.