afshar bagface question

[Henry Rancourt Registered Find all posts View Profile Close Henry Rancourt]

In an earlier post I called the four, white background, shaped designs gulls but I think that may not be correct name. What is the correct name for this design.
Thanks

[John Hutchinson Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close John Hutchinson]

A well-known dealer has this for sale, and describes it as a 'Kurd bagface', late 19th century. It might be of interest to you.




All the best,

John

[John Hutchinson Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close John Hutchinson]

And here is an old 'salon' on Turkotek, in which the design is amply discussed.

http://www.turkotek.com/salon_00136/s136_t8.htm

John

[Joe Lawrence Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Joe Lawrence]

Author Peter Stone refers to the motif as a Kurdish “Herati” pattern used on saddlebags and small rugs.

Hali magazine has a similar piece from the 19c from South Persia and lists it from the Afshar as a Kerman piece.

References:
Stone, Peter, “Tribal & Village Rugs the Definitive Guide to Design, Patterns and Motif” p. 210-211, Motif K-53

”Hali” magazine, no 119, p. 43

[Henry Rancourt Registered Find all posts View Profile Close Henry Rancourt]

After doing some research it seems that Herati and Gul are terms meaning a center medallion and it may include everything within the inner most border. So I'm thinking that, in the case of my afshar, everything within the inner most border, including the four designs with the white background would be called a Gul. Is that correct?

[Henry Rancourt Registered Find all posts View Profile Close Henry Rancourt]

A well-known dealer has this for sale, and describes it as a 'Kurd bagface', late 19th century. It might be of interest to you.




All the best,

John

Hi John. Thanks for your post and photo. The bag face in your post is very similar to mine, including the geometric designs in the wide border. My rug has also been called an Afshar bag face, so I'm trying to determine if mine is an Afshar or Kurd. So, I did a search for Afshar bag face rugs and only found a very few like mine, with similar four white background designs, but the border was quite different. A search for Kurd bag face rugs returned many with a very similar main design, and the main border has geometric shapes like mine. This makes me think my is a Kurdish rug.

[John Hutchinson Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close John Hutchinson]

Hello Henry,

I'm glad that my thoughts were helpful. I'm not an expert, but from what I've observed, the Kurdish versions often have the extra horizontal piece at the bottom, like yours, which I've seen referred to as an 'elem'. If you scroll down to the end of the discussion on the Salon at the link I posted, you'll see that the design may have derived from the 'herati'pattern, and that the four white elements you're interested in may be 'serrated leaves'. I'm not altogether convinced about that, but it's an intriguing possibility.

All the best,

John

[Henry Rancourt Registered Find all posts View Profile Close Henry Rancourt]

Hi John,
I spent time on the Salon and read about the serrated leaves and I'm also not convinced. A few rug sites did mention herati patterns, but said the the four elements might be stylized animals. That is what they look like to me.

[John Hutchinson Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close John Hutchinson]

Hello Henry,

Yes, I think you may be right. Or birds, perhaps? Some of them seem to have 'legs' extending at an oblique angle.

All the best,

John

[Joe Lawrence Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Joe Lawrence]

Many of the true names and meanings of motifs annd symbols are unknown throughout all regions of weaving. It is a lost language that will never return unless some type of Rosetta Stone is found to decipher the lost meanings. This unfortunate reality will take the average researcher down a road of dead ends and a feeling of defeat to include a little sadness.
We must remember that within these old cultures, every symbol, motive and color contained a message and a meaning. It was a symbolic message reflecting hopes, dreams, peace and love. Of course, some meanings have survived… but those too could have been diluted through the generations until the “false” meaning were written down 150 years ago and most authors rug enthusiasts rely on it as factual.
There is a well known book called “Bergama Heybe ve Torba” (Bergama Saddlebag and Bag) that was researched from the late 1960’s into the 2000’s. The research was extensive and the authors travelled to areas inaccessible by vehicles and technology. Deep within the culture even they could not find names and meanings to motifs and simply made up names for the book for easy clarification. They did not do this to deceive the reader but to just give a symbol or motif a name for the ease of interpretation.
Even 40 years ago when weaving was still widely practiced, many weavers did not know what some of the motives meant. Or, many were lost in time and new motives were introduced as a filler. Weavers used memory and previous rugs as examples when making a new piece. When the rugs were sold abroad, in some places there were no old pieces left to use as a reference.

The Memling Gul would be a great example of a lost motif. The Gul was named after a 15c painter Hans Memling because one of his paintings contained a Turkish rug with unknown motifs in it. Since there was no name for the motif, it was simply referred to as the Memling Gul. Old paintings were the photographs of the past and helped to date pieces. For me, naming this beautiful motif after a western painter was an injustice to the history and preservation of vanishing cultures.

So with your piece, don’t be discouraged if you never find what you are looking for. In some cases it’s like looking at a Cuneiform tablet and trying to make sense of it.

[Steve Price Administrator Find all posts View Profile Close Steve Price]

Hi Joe - You wrote, "We must remember that within these old cultures, every symbol, motive and color contained a message and a meaning. It was a symbolic message reflecting hopes, dreams, peace and love." That may be true, but some were probably just decorative. I've got fabrics in my home with all sorts of motifs on them, and none meant anything to the designer except that they were likely to be attractive to buyers.

Steve Price

[Joe Lawrence Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Joe Lawrence]

Very true Steve. I should have been more specific. Years ago that was the case and in some areas today it still hold true. Unfortunately even among the some of the weavers the language and meanings have been lost and today there are many fillers within pieces.
The pieces made for the market in some cases are just garbage and meaningless.

Further information; I will use the Turkish rugs as an example. Every rug or piece I own I can trace nearly every motif and symbol. The information is out there and generally it’s located within the older books. Luckily I own most of the good ones. A majority of the best books on the topic are in German and Turkish which may be challenging for some. Looking on the internet is pretty useless. I would venture to say there is also great info out there on pre-1900 Turkoman pieces concerning motifs and symbols. Unfortunately, the best books on the subject can be spendy.

I mentioned in another post that I’m conducting an extensive catalog and inventory of my pieces. Some single pieces I can finish in a few hours and some take days to complete. I am on item number 64 and counting but there are only a few minor details I could not locate. Most of the time it’s related to which village a piece was made at and at times, some oddball motif that nobody knows what it is.

[Chuck Wagner Administrator Find all posts View Profile Close Chuck Wagner]

Joe, et al.,

My first guess would be that these are a stylization of a boteh.

Cheers
Chuck