Joel Greifinger

Hi all,

Lest we neglect another type of brocade commonly encountered, especially on pieces from Anatolia, here is a saddlebag in reciprocal brocade. While I think it is probably Kurdish and made either in eastern Anatolia or across the border in Iran, around Hoy, I'd be interested in other suggested origins:







There are lots of wonderful pieces (including storage sacks and bags made by various Yuruk groups) patterned in reciprocal brocade. Get out those cameras...

Joel Greifinger

Wayne Anderson

Joel
This is a Turkmen chuval with an overlay-underlay brocade field with a reciprocal brocade major border.

The field design is called hash gul by Parsons and gulak by Moshkova. There are two discussions in the archives about the hash gul.


Wayne

Chuck Wagner

Hi,

Here's another for the parade. A flatweave namakdan, attributed by the seller as Bakhtiari. I'm not sure I agree with that - I've never seen a Bahktiari piece with this particular structure. This looks more like something from NW Iran or the Caucasus (maybe Shahsavan..?), Kurdistan, I think less likely Anatolian but still more likely that, than Bahktiari.

But I digress...

If I'm reading Marla correctly, this is mainly an overlay-underlay brocade structure. It is really stiff - a heavy utilitarian cotton warp with quite robust weft yarns - this thing is as stiff as some of those very tough Baluch pieces. Note the the elevated warps (someone explain that to me) that run up through the center of the design elements. Not by accident, methinks.

I observe that we had a little trouble getting the design organized and aligned, but - rather like in naval gunnery (one long, one short, one down the funnel...) - it all got sorted out in the end. And yes, Hawk-Eye, I did notice that the reds are fugitive and have discolored the piece. I've learned to live with that..:

The front:



The back:




Observe plainweave warp & weft exposed between design elements - the weft yarn stands about 1 mm higher than the ground yarns, giving significant texture to the surface:





Regards
Chuck Wagner

Patrick Weiler

Joel,

That is a nice, complete saddlebag. The design has been attributed to many groups, as noted by Chuck regarding his salt bag. The reciprocal brocade is not often encountered, so it is a good piece to add to the Salon.
From the wealth of pieces posted to this Salon, I can see that my collection is not nearly finished.
Perhaps I should apply for some Stimulus Funding.


Patrick Weiler

Joel Greifinger

Hi Patrick,

I'm speculating on a NE Anatolia/NW Persia origin for my saddlebag based on similarities of structure (reciprocal brocade), design and overall palette with other pieces attributed to that region. Here' one that's currently on the market:



The only other contenders that I know that overlap in all of these criteria are some Kordi khorjins. Here are a couple from Stanzer:





Stanzer notes however that, "the lack of fasteners is typical of Kordi khorjins," so, it's less likely that mine is Kordi. He also says that the Kordi double-bags are "used as a 'container' for lambs born in fields, still too weak to follow the herd."

I guess I should stop picturing a tiny lamb peaking its head out of my saddlebag. Ah well, it might have gotten caught in the loops, anyway.

BTW, of all of the terminological pluralism confronting the flatweave newbie, the number of terms used in the literature for what we're calling 'reciprocal brocade' (following Marla ) may win the ruggie Tower of Babel sweepstakes.

Joel Greifinger

Joseph E. Beck

Joel, did you see the New England Rug Society presentation on Shiraz piled weavings? One of the myths the presenters discussed was that one, and when they brought it up everyone cracked up laughing. But then they showed a photo from around 1920 with a bag holding some baby lambs during a river crossing. Dead silence. I guess even dealers making up stories get one right occasionally :-)

joe