Image Carpets

Antique Shirvan Runner- 160413

The middle blue ground of this dated (1234 or 1239, 1817 or  1823) rare Shirvan runner displays  palmettes, stars and knots along the central axis.  There are six borders, two brown-black rosette minors, an innermost stylised gold flower stripe and, most saliently, a colourful wedge and hook ivory main border. Other examples of this select group are also dated quite early in the nineteenth century and share the long format. The color schemes are also invariant, always featuring  medium blue and ivory,. with detail tones in yellow, red, apricot, green and brown-black. The field is often more open than on our example which nicely balances ornament with  spaciousness.  The weave is good for a Shirvan, with  about 100 knots per square inch. The wefts are cotton, and the warps are mixed light and dark wool, a typical Shirvan identifier. The condition is very good for a rug of this period and it has been very carefully treated throughout it long lifetime. Although no attempt has been made to list all  the known examples, there  are probably not more than a half dozen readily at hand. They all seem to emanate from a single, accomplished workshop active in the first half of the nineteenth century.