Antique Persian Rugs

As far as we know, rugs were first chronicled in Beni Hassan, ancient Egypt, two

Manufacturing Methods: Practically the same method of weaving was employed for thousands of years—a loom made of two horizontal poles that were the width of the carpet worked colored threads into a pile, then the weaver cut the knot to the desired height with shears and each row was hammered down with a comb. Although simple in theory, the process required a lot of skill to stretch the warp and keep the spaces even, in tying the knots and in following the intricate designs. Most of these designs were carried in the mind of the weaver, handed down from generation to generation, and the same design would be given an individual touch and a unique interpretation by every weaver.

There are two main methods of knotting the pile—the Senna or Persian knot and the Ghordes or Turkish knot. The number of knots to the square inch determine the rug's texture with some fine Kermans or Sennas having four to six hundred knots per square inch and some Turkish rugs having only thirty. It takes a good weaver one minute to tie three knots so he would take about ten years, working eight hours a day, to make a ten by twelve Kerman rug. As you can understand, he would make only a few rugs in his lifetime before his eyesight gave out.

Materials Used: The materials used to make antique Persian rugs varied from sheep's wool and cotton to silk and camel hair. These materials were spun into yarn—a stong thread for the warp, a single for the woof and double for the pile—and the spinning was done entirely by hand. We might picture the people of a nomadic tribe spinning lumps of wool onto hand held sticks as they drove their flocks before them. The colors came from the use of animal and vegetable dyes, the blue obtained form indigo, yellow from turmeric, brown from walnut husks and a beautiful red from kermes, the dried bodies of an insect known in ancient Egypt and which are still used today. These colors were made in small portions from day to day, often running out during the making of a rug and it was impossible to get the exact shade again. This gave the rugs a special character which added to their value and which sometimes imparted the effect of a glimmering light over the whole due to the subtle changes in the shades of the wool.

Design Sources: The designs of these rugs are fascinating and unfold like a story. We first are struck by the colors, then the general design scheme and lastly the pattern and detail. The origins of these designs is a mystery though they almost certainly were influenced by the patterns of the rush mats that preceded them. But the popular hypothesis is that since the Near Eastern idea of Paradise was a garden, that is what is most likely depicted in the designs, with borders, fruits, flowers and birds. Persians loved their walled, orderly, sheltered gardens which have strikingly similar design elements to those found on their carpets.

It is important to recognize that each genuine antique rug is an expression of the joy, sorrow, love and religious feelings of one individual, be it an offering by a young girl to her future husband or a grave covering made for a beloved friend. And whereas the Western world uses rugs mainly as floor covering, they were often the only furniture that an oriental knew, using them to sit, sleep, eat and pray on, and often on the same rug throughout an entire lifetime. Though none of the rug makers were schooled in the arts, they seemed to have had an intuitive feel for the beautiful which showed through in their products.

Modern Iraq (ancient Babylon) and Iran (ancient Persia), along withTurkey, India and China, still have thriving rug trades but commercialism had taken over their manufacture by the middle of the nineteenth century. They use synthetic dyes and automated processes although rugs are still largely a hand-loomed product in these countries. To the educated eye, these modern rugs are easy to tell apart from genuine antique Persian rugs even if they have the same designs.