Hi Horst,
Thank you for the pics. Yes indeed, their medallions show good analogies with those of some of the Scheunemann rugs too. The palette of the "Romanian" rug seems different though, with its strong dominance of a golden yellow instead of the two indigos (strong and medium), saturated red and saturated orange which characterize the Scheunemann rugs. I'll try to find a color picture of the (interesting) second rug, if possible.
There is a misunderstanding though: I was not at all suggesting that the Dutch had established weaving workshops in Holland in order to secure production of studio props for the painters. (This seems highly unlikely to me too
:,) but only reporting the documented fact that some rug weaving workshops, often small I guess, existed at the time (15th-17th century) in several countries of Europe, including in Holland, selling their production to upper class customers for the main usage of the time: as table decoration. Some workshops, like those of Ferrara or Mantova, were created by a local dynast or a member of his family and may have disappeared after his/her death. It is possible according to the mentioned experts, but not proven, that one of these Dutch workshops was the source of the Scheunemann's rugs. An Oriental origin, (including in Persia, India, Anatolia or in the area including the Caucasus for example), cannot be excluded though and would be my personal favorite hypothesis, out of purely romantic reasons
.
Regards
Pierre