Rugs: Oriental and Occidental, Antique & Modern Part 9

OWNED BY MR. GEORGE HUBBARD HOLT, CHICAGO.]

SILK RUGS

Long before other countries learned the art of cultivating silkworms, China was at work weaving fabrics of silk. Chinese historians claim that the origin of reeling silk and putting it to use was discovered by a woman,--Se-Ling-She, wife of Hw.a.n.g-te, third Emperor of China,--and for that reason she has always been regarded by them as the "G.o.ddess of silkworms," The date of this discovery is about 2640 B. C. For about two thousand years the Chinese kept secret their methods of reeling and weaving silk, but finally j.a.pan, Persia, and India learned the art, Persia having for many centuries transported raw silk between China and the West. Very slowly grew the process of silk-weaving. Greece, Spain, and Sicily by degrees attained the knowledge. In A. D. 550 it was introduced into Constantinople, and in 1148 silk manufacture was carried into Italy, and the cultivation of mulberry trees was enforced by law.

The industry soon spread into the south of France, where it rapidly advanced.

At the present day enormous quant.i.ties of silk are produced in various parts of the world. The princ.i.p.al countries are China, j.a.pan, India, Southern Europe, and some parts of Persia and Asia Minor. During the Middle Ages and down to the seventeenth century, the province of Ghilan in Persia produced very fine silk and in large quant.i.ties. In all the countries and districts just mentioned, magnificent silk rugs have been woven for many centuries.

The silk rug when at its best is unsurpa.s.sed in beauty; it is distinguished by its richness, exquisite coloring, and rare sheen. But silk rugs require the most luxurious surroundings: nothing looks so out of place as one of these costly fabrics of the loom in a poor setting.

They are more suitable for decorative purposes and museums than for service; they should be used as hangings, not for floor coverings. An exquisite silk rug interwoven with pearls is hung before the famous Peac.o.c.k Throne of the Shah at Teheran, Persia.

The most magnificent silk rugs have been woven in China, and these are interesting from every point of view, especially as regards history, color, and texture. The silk rugs of Khotan are remarkable for their beauty and fineness; on important occasions of state and ceremony the Chinese place them upon the table. Silk carpets of special beauty worked with gold threads are made in Pekin for the Imperial Palace, although many of this kind found at the Court are said to be of Central Asiatic origin.

In making silk rugs, the greatest care is necessary in the shading.

Sometimes the shading of woollen rugs is made more effective by the addition of silk.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PERSIAN SILK RUG

SIZE, 5.8 4.12

_This remarkable rug in some lights suggests the heart of a forest. Some of its sections indicate Chinese inspiration, and recall, too, the famous Hunting Rugs. The field is in an unusual shade of reddish bronze, with a strong metallic l.u.s.tre. In certain lights the surface looks like a ma.s.s of gleaming gold. In the centre stands the Tree of Life, its branches rich with foliage, among which birds of bright plumage seem to flutter. At the base of the tree two wild animals are depicted, apparently in search of prey. In the corner area at the top of the rug two serpents are attacking young birds in a nest, which is guarded by an agitated parent bird. On either side at the base of the rug is a cypress tree. Across the top is an inscription in Arabic._

OWNED BY MRS. EMMONS BLAINE, CHICAGO.]

As the demand for silk rugs is comparatively small, they are seldom woven on speculation. When made to order in Persia, they cost from ten dollars to fifteen dollars per square foot; thus the usual price of a silk rug of Persian make is from two hundred dollars up to thousands of dollars. Those made in Turkey can be bought much cheaper.

The Turkoman silk rugs are generally twice the size of the usual sheep's wool or camel's hair rugs. They are very fine, and often two hundred dollars is paid for a rug of this kind eight feet square.

Rugs made of raw silk are exported from Samarkand, and silk rugs of old Persian designs are copied and woven at Caesarea. Some weavers of the modern silk rug, however, do not have recourse to established designs; they give play to their imagination, as do the weavers of wool rugs.

Other weavers copy chiefly designs from chintz, and still others work from designs introduced from Europe.

Mrs. Bishop tells us that silk produced at Resht is brought to Kashan to be spun and dyed. Then it is sent to Sultanabad to be woven into rugs.

It is next returned to Resht to have the pile cut by the sharp instruments used for cutting the velvet pile. After the rugs are finished, they are sent to Teheran to be sold.

FELT RUGS

In the Orient a large and heavy rug is made of felt. This is used extensively by the natives, but is too heavy to export. Even the shepherds of the Kotan-Daria and of the Keriya-Daria use it in their primitive and isolated abodes. Sometimes an old felt rug is propped up by poles and becomes a tent, in which dwell the shepherds of Central Asia.

This felt rug is made of the hair of the camel, goat, or sheep, or by a mixture of all these kinds. It is matted together by heavy and constant pounding, moistened with water, turned and beaten again and again until it becomes compact and solid. Sometimes the felts are decorated with colored threads and often the name of the weaver is woven in. Among the best felts are those made at Astrabad and Yezd.

In color felts are gray, brown, or white. The last named are woven at Khotan. No dye is used; the hue is that of the hair of the animal, or the composite hue resulting from the mixture of the hair of different animals.

[Ill.u.s.tration: DERBENT RUG

SIZE, 7.2 4.6

As a representative Derbent rug, this is an excellent example. It has the soft thick texture and long pile characterizing this product of the Caucasus. The entire dark blue field is covered with well-proportioned lozenge-shaped forms, distinctly outlined with serrated lines. Every centre has a cross of a color contrasting with the form containing it.

The main border stripe is geometrical, with a variety of the hook design. Several floral devices are arranged in the maroon stripes on either side the wide one. There is a good deal of l.u.s.tre to the rug, and the coloring is particularly charming in fine blues, soft rose, fawn, copper brown, subdued yellows, ivory, and rich green.

OWNED BY MRS. ARTHUR DANE WHEELER, CHICAGO.]

The felts have no seams, and are from one to four inches thick. Although this material is of far more ancient date than the days of St. Clement, a legend connects his name with the discovery of felt. The tradition is that while on a pilgrimage the Saint, having put a wad of carded wool into his shoes to protect his feet from blisters, found at the end of his journey that the pressure and moisture had converted the wool into felt.

HUNTING RUGS

The hunting rugs of Persia are the most remarkable and interesting rugs in existence. They had their origin in the Chinese pictures of hunting scenes, from which they were copied. They were undoubtedly made as early as the sixteenth century for the Shah. Exquisite in their weaving, marvellous in coloring, and of rare sheen, they are worthy of the closest attention. Nor is this their only merit; they serve as records of ancient customs, depicting the method of the chase, and portraying the mounted hunters in pursuit of the elephant, lion, phoenix, deer, and other creatures, fabulous and real. There are perhaps twelve of these precious rugs in existence. One, in silk, belongs to the Imperial House of Austria, another to Baron Adolphe Rothschild, a third is in the Palace at Stockholm, and a fourth, in wool, smaller than those mentioned, is in the possession of M. J. Maciet, Paris.

V

RUG-WEAVING IN EUROPE AND THE UNITED STATES

In the preparation of this section of this work, there has been no attempt or desire to slight in any way the weaving industry of the West.

It has not seemed advisable, however, to go into many details on the subject, for it is one easily learned from many sources by any one who desires. There is not the mystery about Occidental weaving that there is about Oriental, the latter perhaps appealing to our innate desire of acquiring knowledge difficult of access. A short account of rug-weaving in Europe and the United States will, therefore, be quite as satisfactory to the general reader as a more lengthy description.

GREEK RUGS

Greek rugs are almost as ancient as Greece herself. Many an old love-song of this land has praised the skill of the woman deftly plying the hand loom. But if one expects to see the glory of ancient Greece, in its perfection of form and design, transmitted in any degree to the industry of modern rug-weaving he will be disappointed. From time immemorial rugs have const.i.tuted a most important part of the dowry of a young girl from the provinces. Even now the courting of a bride in Crete is often prefaced with the question whether the girl is skilled in the handling of a loom. But the modern Greek rug is seldom seen outside of its own country, for it is generally made for home use, and the weaver is not easily induced to part with it. Besides this, the foreign market would not be large for them, especially in compet.i.tion with the well-known and excellent Oriental rugs.

Greek rugs are of two kinds--the heavy ones which serve for floor coverings in the winter, and the thinner, which are used all the year round. Both are made of home-produced wool, often with hemp woof, and are worked by women and girls only, in wooden looms of a primitive order.

Athens is the only place in Greece where rugs are produced in a factory.

Under the patronage of Her Majesty the Queen, an a.s.sociation for the Education of Poor Women exists. This philanthropic a.s.sociation has founded an industrial inst.i.tution which employs four hundred women and girls in its various departments, of whom about thirty are engaged in rug-weaving. The best rugs are those purely Grecian in design and quality, and for these special orders are generally sent in. The rugs thus woven are durable and effective. Sometimes an attempt is made to imitate Turkish rugs, but without their superb effect. Coa.r.s.e rugs of an inferior cla.s.s are sold in the bazaars of Athens. The predominant color in these is a dingy white, with stripes of various colors at the ends.

The rug is really durable, though the noticeable, fuzzy nap soon wears off.

MOORISH AND SPANISH RUGS

The Arab conquerors of Spain, or the Moors as they are often called, are believed to have taught the Spaniards and Venetians the art of rug-weaving. The rugs now known as Moorish are made by the descendants of this race. Their leading color is yellow, and in style and quality they resemble the so-called Smyrna rug. Antique Moorish rugs are found in the cathedrals of Toledo and Seville. These are relics of the thirteenth century and have geometric designs.

_Morocco_ rugs are Moorish. Those of modern manufacture are very inferior. The poorest aniline dyes are used, and it seems hardly possible that the splendid specimens of the fourteenth to the end of the seventeenth century were woven in Morocco. But the rugs in the Sultan's palace at Fez prove this fact, as does the splendid antique rug in the possession of Prince Schwarzenberg, at Vienna. Fez was formerly one of the chief seats of the rug industry, which is now limited mostly to Rabat. Unfortunately, aniline dyes are now largely used, and even the designs are less artistic than in former years. There is, however, a rug not known to the trade, and only rarely met with outside its home. It is the _Tuareg_ rug, and is woven by the Berbers, a tribe occupying the desert south of Algeria and Tunis, and known as Tuareg or Tawarek by the Arabs. The Tuaregs are great traders, and control the princ.i.p.al caravan routes. Their rugs are woven by the women, and seldom if ever leave the families which weave them. The most beautiful are used as shrouds, and are buried with their owners.

_Tunis_ sends out a few rugs woven at Kairuan. They are thick, heavy, but inferior in many ways to rugs of Oriental workmans.h.i.+p.

BOSNIAN, SERVIAN, ROUMANIAN, AND BULGARIAN RUGS