Produced by The Online Distributed Proofreading Team at
https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images
generously made available by The Internet Archive/American
Libraries.)
THE ORIENTAL RUG
[Illustration:
PLATE I.
ANTIQUE LADIK
_Prayer Rug_
FROM THE COLLECTION OF MR. GEORGE H. ELLWANGER
Size: 3.10 x 6]
THE ORIENTAL RUG
A MONOGRAPH ON
EASTERN RUGS AND CARPETS,
SADDLE-BAGS, MATS & PILLOWS.
WITH A CONSIDERATION OF KINDS
AND CLASSES, TYPES, BORDERS,
FIGURES, DYES, SYMBOLS ETC.
TOGETHER WITH SOME PRACTICAL
ADVICE TO COLLECTORS.
BY W. D. ELLWANGER
Author of
"A Summer Snowflake"
NEW YORK:
DODD, MEAD & COMPANY.
1909
_Copyright, 1903_
BY DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY
Published September, 1903
PREFACE
That Oriental rugs are works of art in the highest sense of the term, and
that fine antique specimens, of even modest size, have a financial value
of ten, fifteen, or thirty-eight thousand dollars, has been recently
determined at public auction. At this auction, several nations had a
representative voice in the bidding, and the standard of price was fairly
established. The value of rugs may have been imaginary and sentimental
heretofore; it is now a definite fact, with figures apparently at the
minimum. What the maximum may prove, remains to be seen.
Choice old rugs, therefore, to-day come into the same class with genuine
paintings of the old Dutch School; with canvases of Teniers, Ruysdael,
Cuyp, Ostade, or whatever similar artist's work may have escaped the
museums. They vie in prestige with the finest examples of Corot, Diaz,
Troyon, or Daubigny; and in monetary supremacy they overtop the rarest and
grandest of Chinese porcelains.
And yet the Oriental rug, as against such competitors for the wealthy
collectors' favour, has hardly a history, and is practically without a
name or a pedigree. Experts will tell you at a glance whether or not your
Wouverman is genuine, or inform you where every true Corot was owned or
whence it was bartered or stolen. In Chinese porcelains, the knowing
dealer will easily prove to you not only under what dynasty but in what
decade or year a particular piece was produced.
The painting has descent, signature, or the brush mark of a school to
father it. The Chinese vase, bowl, or jar has its marks, cyphers, stamps
and dates, and an undoubted genealogy to vouch for its authenticity. The
rug must speak for itself and go upon its intrinsic merits. It is its own
guarantee and certificate of artistic and financial value.
The study of Oriental rugs, therefore, can never lead to an exact science
or approximate dogmatic knowledge. Whoever is interested in them must
needs rely upon his personal judgment or the seller's advice. There is
practically only one current book authority in the premises.
A new volume on the subject would thus seem to be well justified. It is
the hope of the author that this book may prove itself sound and
practical, and that it may help to make more clear and simple the right
appreciation of a valuable rug.
W. D. ELLWANGER
ROCHESTER, N.Y., 1903
CONTENTS
Chapter Page
I. THE MYSTERY OF THE RUG 3
II. GENERAL CLASSIFICATION 13
III. OF THE MAKING, AND OF DESIGNS, BORDERS, ETC. 21
IV. OF THE DYEING 35
V. OF PERSIAN RUGS, SPECIFICALLY 43
VI. CAUCASIAN RUGS, DAGHESTAN AND RUSSIAN TYPES 61
VII. OF TURKISH VARIETIES 69
VIII. TURKOMAN OR TURKESTAN RUGS 79
IX. OF ORIENTAL CARPETS, SADDLE-BAGS, PILLOWS, ETC. 93
X. AUCTIONS, AUCTIONEERS, AND DEALERS 107
XI. INSCRIPTIONS AND DATES 121
XII. GENERAL OBSERVATIONS AND PARTICULAR ADVICE 131
LIST OF PLATES
PLATE
I. LADIK _Frontispiece_
II. KONIAH _Facing page_ 22
III. KAZAK " " 36
IV. SEHNA " " 44
V. CHICHI " " 50
VI. KABISTAN " " 62
VII. GHEORDEZ " " 70
VIII. KOULAH " " 72
IX. MELEZ " " 74
X. BELUCHISTAN " " 80
XI. ANATOLIAN PILLOWS " " 94
XII. BERGAMA " " 124
The Oriental Rug
CHAPTER I
THE MYSTERY OF THE RUG
To judge of an Oriental rug rightly, it must be looked at from several
points of view, or, at least, from two aspects; against the light and with
the light. From the first standpoint, against the light of knowledge,
speaking figuratively, there may be seen only a number of rude and awkward
figures in crude colours scattered erratically on a dark or dingy-looking
background, a fringe of coarse and ragged strings at either end, and rough
frays of yarn at the sides. This is what is accepted by many people as an
Oriental rug. And indeed this is what most rugs are.
If, on the other hand, we view our rugs with the light of a better wisdom
and happier experience, we will see the richest and softest of colours,
the most harmonious shadings and blendings, medallions brilliant as
jewels, or geometrical designs beautiful as the rose windows of a
cathedral; or, again, graceful combinations of charmingly conventionalized
flowers and delicate traceries and arabesques,--all these displaying new
glories of ever changing and never tiring beauty. Each woven picture, too,
is as soft to tread upon as a closely mown lawn, and caresses the feet
that sink into its pile. These are Oriental rugs as their admirers know
and love them.
Perhaps the chief charm of all such beautiful rugs is in their mystery.
Their designs are odd and strange and full of hidden meanings, and their
effects are often evolved from the crudest and clumsiest figures, hooks
and squares and angles; they owe their wealth of colour to simple
vegetable dyes from the woods and fields and gardens, and yet the secret
of many of these dyes is still a secret, or has long ago been lost. The
places whence the rugs come, the people who make them and those who sell
them, all are mysterious and hard to know and understand.
Moreover, broadly speaking, there are no experts on the subject, no
authorities, no literature. He who would know them must learn them by
experience. The rug dealers, for the most part, seem to treat their wares
merely as so much merchandise, and what knowledge concerning them they are
willing to impart is so contradictory as to be almost valueless. Few of
them would agree upon the name of an example which might be out of the
ordinary, or be able to tell where it was made. Ask of them what a "Mecca"
is, and they will stammer in their varying answers. And yet the Armenians
who handle most of the rugs in this country are often highly educated, and
fully appreciate the beauty of their wares. Their taste, however, is not
always our taste, and all the Orientalists seem to retain their barbaric
fondness for crude and startling colours. When we would turn to books for
information in the matter we find that the authorities are not many. They
might be numbered on your fingers and thumbs. These few books, moreover,
have been published only in limited editions at high prices, and are not
easily obtainable. One of the most important of such works is the
sumptuously illustrated, elephantine folio, issued in Vienna in 1892 by
the Imperial and Royal Austrian and Commercial Museum. And, elaborate as
this authority is, the modest editor, by way of apology, says in the
preface that "no pretensions are made toward perfection owing to the
little information that we can fall back upon." A recent authority on the
subject is John Kimberly Mumford, and his volume on Oriental Rugs,
published in 1900, has thrown much light on the subject. Too great praise
cannot be given to this work and to his later studies in the same field.
Still, no one knows it all, and the mystery of Oriental rugs only deepens
as we try to learn. The little that any one may really know of them
through experience, through questioning and elusive answers, through
conversations with obliging and polite vendors, and through foreign travel
even, is, when all is said, only a patchwork of knowledge. Consider how
stupendous and hopeless would be the task of one who would dare endeavour
to analyze, criticise, classify, and co-ordinate the paintings of the past
five centuries, were no names signed to them or no appreciable number of
pictures painted by the same known artist.
He who would write of rugs has a like condition to face.
And alas! also, whoever would write on this subject must now treat of it
principally as history. The characteristic rugs, the antique rugs, the
rare specimens, are seldom to be bought. They are in museums, or in the
hands of collectors who hold them in even a tighter fist.
Twenty years ago the warning was given that the choice old rugs were
growing scarce; the years following found fewer still upon the market. Two
or three years ago one of the largest wholesale houses in New York,
carrying a stock of half a million or a million dollars, had no antiques
to show. In the autumn of 1902, another large New York importer who had
just returned from Persia, Tiflis, and Constantinople admitted that he had
not brought back one valuable antique piece.
Nevertheless, the true enthusiast need not be discouraged. From wandering
dealers, in odd corners, at the unexpected or by chance, one may happen on
a choice specimen.
The very word "Persian" is a synonym for opulence, splendour,
gorgeousness; and "Oriental" means beauty and wonder and the magic of the
"Arabian Nights." From the Aladdin's cave of the mystical East, therefore,
we may still hope to gather treasure and spoil.