Third quarter of the 19th century, very rare and archaic carpet of the wandering nomads, Khamseh/Quashqai tribe.

Very rare and archaic carpet of the wandering nomads, Khamseh/Quashqai tribe, third quarter of the 19th century. NOTE: it belongs to a small number of ??Qashqai carpets with a particularly delicate design, woven by nomadic tribes with soft wool dyed in a wide range of wonderful natural colours. A less refined carpet, dated 1865, is published in James Opie's "Tribal Carpets of Southern Persia" Oregon, 1981, pp. 80-83. A further smaller example on a white background dated 1270AH 1853AD is published by Hadi Maktabi, "Lost & found", Hali, pp. 78-79. A third is exhibited at the Young Museum in San Francisco. This demonstrates a certain production of Quashaqi tribal carpets of this quality in the mid-19th century. Ours, with its very sharp design, was probably made in the third quarter of the century. The field decorated with birds and stylized Boteh and the black border with Boteh motifs is extremely rare. It measures 145 x 207 cm. In excellent condition, including pile. Without obvious and/or significant restorations. The boteh is a symbolic and enigmatic motif used in carpet knotting. It contains a symbolism that has not yet been fully revealed, based on different meanings. Many scholars trace it back to the eye, thus giving it a protective and defensive connotation, or perhaps it is the image of the bird of prey, which would have the same connotation. In reality, it seems that the boteh also contains a message of prosperity and abundance. In the contours of the symbol, jagged frames often appear that recall the plumage of birds or, again, containing bird heads with the eye and tuft of feathers inside. Occasionally the figures are contained within each other as an internal design, the symbol par excellence of fertility, as in the case of our carpet. Correlations of a spiritual and morphological order seem, however, to be the main message of the symbol, as common as it is mysterious. Bibliography: Doris Eder-Erich Aschenbrenner, Oriental Carpets - Caucasian and Persian, Sonzogno, 1989.