August 11th, 2009, 10:37 AM   1
Marvin Amstey
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Tibetan door rug

Good morning all.
Pictured below is a rug I recently acquired. It is probably 19th c. but could be later. It measures about 2.5 x 5.8. Are there any Tibet scholars out there who could translate the script in the cartouche? Help is appreciated.
August 11th, 2009, 02:33 PM   2
Richard Larkin
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Hi Marvin,

I would think the rug has to be post 1985 or so, as the pattern is obviously multiple windows open on a computer screen.

Just kidding. A beautiful thing. Congrats. Sorry I can't help with the script.

Rich Larkin
August 12th, 2009, 05:42 AM   3
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richard tomlinson

hi jerry

says "download internet explorer 8"

sorry - couldnt help myself after reading rich's comments :-)

looks almost new but that maroony red looks very good and seems to be a sign of old pieces. i take it that it's all wool?

obviously reads well hanging and not on the floor.

nice piece but a little too stiff in design for me personally.

cheers
richard tomlinson
August 12th, 2009, 06:00 AM   4
Steve Price
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Hi Richard

If you would, please overwrite the word "unregistered" with Richard Tomlinson in the user name field when you post.

Thanks, and regards.

Steve Price
August 12th, 2009, 07:06 AM   5
richard tomlinson
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sorry - i put my name in the title section ! it's that damn ID thing.....
August 12th, 2009, 08:09 AM   6
Steve Price
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Hi Richard

I know it's a bit of a nuisance, but that ID thing is what keeps our forum from being buried in spam. The alternative, which most public forums use, is to not permit posting by anyone not registered. Some don't even allow unregistered people to read the forum.

Regards

Steve Price
August 12th, 2009, 09:18 AM   7
Marvin Amstey
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It is wool, and I'm fairly sure this was never on a floor. It hung as an entrance cover to a Tibetan (or at least a Buddhist temple of the order from Tibet in whatever country) monastery. Its one of the oldest looking of the very few I have seen published. Its ordered graphics (which I don't find "stiff") follow from my Turkmen days.
August 12th, 2009, 09:43 AM   8
Rich Larkin
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Hi Marvin,

Was the rug woven in the typical Tibetan manner? Is it possible to post an image of the back, reasonably close? The diagnostic technique is usually evident from what look like (but aren't) irregularities in the weave.

Rich Larkin
August 12th, 2009, 09:51 AM   9
richard tomlinson
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hey marvin (and not jerry - sorry)

my comment re: floor was meant to imply that this could NEVER be displayed on a floor. it has a 'top to bottom' reading - if that makes sense.

as to age. well, i have seen so few pieces that supposedly date to even 1880 or earlier that i have given up. it's assumed if it's tibetan it must be LATE 19C at best.

and as i said (personally), "stiff" is MY interpretation. some rug folks like 'ordered' graphics - they say it's a sign of good weaving ; the weaver being in total control of design etc etc. anything considered 'tribal' , 'funky', 'naive', 'arty' etc etc is considered a lack of control or 'sloppy'

purely interpretation...

all i can say is that your rug looks totally unique - which in rugdom can be a bad thing.

unless there are 'published' examples with which to compare, it may well remain an 'outsider' rug. that's what i hate about the ruggie world - we are virtually 'told' what is or is not 'collectible' or 'desirable' - irrespective of aesthetic appeal.

richard
August 12th, 2009, 09:55 AM  10
richard tomlinson
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Rich L

can u explain in more detail what you mean by 'the diagnostic technique'?

i'm really interested in tibetan rugs and there's so little info available....

thanks
rt
August 12th, 2009, 10:28 AM  11
Steve Price
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Hi Richard

... we are virtually 'told' what is or is not 'collectible' or 'desirable' - irrespective of aesthetic appeal.

There are fashions that come and go in collectibility, and they are manipulated to some extent. This influences market value, of course. But if you choose to collect what your brain tells you is beautiful and desirable, what's preventing you from doing it? Many collectors (Marvin comes to mind pretty easily as an example) follow their preferences even when it takes them out of the collector mainstream. They are often ahead of the trend, but even when they aren't, their collections and collecting are satisfying for them.

Regards

Steve Price
August 12th, 2009, 10:32 AM   12
richard tomlinson
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steve

EXACTLY ! :-)

richard
August 12th, 2009, 11:59 AM   13
Paul Smith
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Martin, et al--

It is a beautiful and enchanting rug. I can't read Tibetan, but I'd swear those lamas had woven in a "captcha" website security device into that cartouche. If you could figure out what those letters were, you gained access to the inner sanctum. Otherwise the monastery would be filled with spam, which is a problem for Buddhist vegetarians.

Paul
August 12th, 2009, 12:18 PM   14
Marvin Amstey
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Here are four references to images of "door rugs":
Kuloy - Tibetan rugs, p.141. This is similar to a rug currently on Rugrabbit and is late 20th c.

Page - The Woven Mystery: old Tibetan rugs, p.87. This is an image from "Tibetan Rugs" from the Oslo Museum of Applied Arts, plate 16

Larsson - Carpets from China, Xinjiang and Tibet, p.128. Also late 20th c.

Eiland and Eiland - Orientla Carpets, p.340; 19th c.

Sorry that I have no time to copy them at the moment. When I return in a week, I'll post some details and more images of my rug. In the meantime, here are two more images of tibetan rugs from my collection:



This is a relatively old - late 19th c. saddle.



This is a rug made by Tibetan weavers in Nepal to my order in the 21st c. It is a copy of Chinese Calligraphy, complete with collectors' stamps: a good floor rug.
Enjoy.
August 12th, 2009, 03:27 PM   15
Joel Greifinger
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Here are a couple of other images of Tibetan door rugs. The first is from Hali.com:



The next, which has popped up on Turkotek before, is from Tom Cole's "Dream Weavers":



Joel Greifinger
August 12th, 2009, 08:28 PM   16
Derek Dyckman
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Hi Marvin,

Wow! A tiger door rug. Must have been commissioned for a high ranking official. I would guess that the text is some kind of sacred blessing for the home owner. The last character on the right is almost certainly a Tibetan '2'. The character immediately beside that looks like the conjunct consonant 'gra'.
How many colors by the way? Any noticeable abrash(however small) in the blues detected anywhere on the pile?

Regards,

Derek Dyckman
August 12th, 2009, 09:53 PM  17
Rich Larkin
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Hi Richard T,

Tibetan rugs, or at least a large percentage of them, were woven using the "senneh loop" technique, so-called. Rather than tying and cutting individual knots in the conventional manner, the weaver would loop yarn first around warps in a particular way, then around a metal rod that was above and parallel to the wefts, continuing along the horizontal row. When a row was finished, the loops at the top side of the rod were cut, resulting in a piled fabric. Viewed from the back, the rug looks generally like other hand-knotted rugs, with the nodes of the knots visible; but on account of the techniques employed, the nodes are not even and regular in all sections of the rug. An uninformed inspector, familiar with other types of knotted pile rugs, would take the Tibetan article to be one containing many weaving errors.

There are a couple of instructive illustrations of the technique in Murray Eiland's Chinese and Exotic Rugs. If you're interested, I could scan and post them. Let me know.

Murray's brother, Emmettt, wrote an interesting book entitled Oriental Rugs Today. It is partially reproduced on Google Books, and I know I recently viewed a version of it that reproduced the sections on Tibetan rugs; but I couldn't drum it up tonight on the computer. I found a partial reproduction of the book, but the Tibetan parts were left out. It doesn't cover the weaving issue, but it has some very interesting specific information about rug production in Tibet and later in Nepal by refugee Tibetans. Perhaps you can do a better job of finding it than I. If I find it, I'll post the link.

Rich Larkin
August 13th, 2009, 07:22 AM   18
richard tomlinson
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hi rich L

thanks for the info. i'm hopeless trying to visualise weaving techniques. even photos do not help. i've read denny's book on tibet carpets, which has images of the structure. i doubt eiland's book will help me much further.

as far as tibetan rugs go, i find it hard,if not impossible, to distinguish between what a 'workshop' rug would be (as i believe most are) and what an authentic or 'tribal' rug would have been.

there seem to be no distinguishing features. as far as i can tell, workshop rugs were woven around the turn of the century. there seem to be VERY few tibetan rugs that pre-date this era.

i have a tibet khaden (shown on turkotek before) which is all wool, and has great natural dyes. and it is considered a 'workshop' rug - for export to nepal. examining the back, one can find irregularites such as coloured knots inserted in odd places. in one section, there appears some green wefting, which does not occur anywhere else. i wonder why workshop weavers would include these? seems rather 'tribal' to me.

but now i am rambling........

marvin - that saddle is a KILLER piece !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

regards
richard tomlinson
August 13th, 2009, 08:35 AM   19
Rich Larkin
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Hi Richard,

I don't know that workshop vs. tribal is all that useful as a model for categorizing Tibetan rugs. Murray Eiland's 1979 book has a good discussion of the evidence for a very old indigenous tradition of pile weaving in that area. There are a few historical references to napped or piled weaving, and the "Senneh loop" technique is one that has no contemporary regional analogs, though it does have some ancient ones. In the end, though, he concluded that his leaning was to no significant tradition of pile weaving in Tibet. Emmett Eiland's book suggests that much of the contemporary Tibetan (i. e., Nepalese) weaving grew out of a re-invention of the craft, so to speak. He discusses specific individuals.

Regarding the single tufts you mentioned, the standard Tibetan method includes odd tufts inserted here and there. They are tied individually around a single warp, not as part of the metal rod routine. They contribute to the characteristic look of the back of the rugs.

Rich Larkin
August 13th, 2009, 08:52 AM  20
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hi rich

you wrote;

Regarding the single tufts you mentioned, the "standard Tibetan method" includes odd tufts inserted here and there. They are tied individually around a single warp, not as part of the metal rod routine. They contribute to the characteristic look of the back of the rugs.


are you saying this is typical of workshop stuff? or typical of everyday tibetan weaving? or simply a characteristic of tibetan rugs (given there seems to be no distinction)?

im confused............ .....

regards
richard
August 13th, 2009, 09:35 AM  21
Dinie Gootjes
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Hi All,

Marvin, I don't own any Tibetan rug, nor do I know much about them, but I like the design vocabulary. Having lived in Korea for 10 years, there is something vaguely but pleasantly familiar about them. So also with Chinese rugs.
May I add my WOW to the saddle? And that calligraphy piece came out well. Cool idea.

Are the horizontal lines that are visible in the pile of your first rug, and probably also in a few of the others, a result of the metal rod technique, or are there many wefts between the rows of knots? Rich, I would love to see an illustration of the technique from Eiland's book.

Dinie
August 13th, 2009, 09:47 AM   22
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hey dinie

an aside : you lived in korea for 10 years? i just got back a year ago after spending 2 years teaching there. i was in masan (about 45 min from busan). i didn't want to leave !! :-(

great country - great food !!! asia in general is a wonderful place to live.

i visited quite a few buddhist temples while there. i spent some time looking for antiques but could never find anything....

would be interested to hear about your experiences !

cheers
richard
August 13th, 2009, 09:30 PM   23
Rich Larkin
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Hi Richard and Dinie,

First, please understand I'm no expert on Tibetan rugs. I've picked up a few tidbits over the years, chiefly to be able to distinguish them from Chinese rugs. I own one saddle rug that I bought because I liked it, posted below.

Richard, I don't know for a fact that all Tibetan rugs were woven with the Senneh loop technique. I am sure that all the rugs I've identified confidently as Tibetan exhibit the weaving anomalies that result from the technique. Whether other conventionally woven Tibetan rugs exist that have escaped my notice, I can't say. Viewed as a finished product, the anomalies simply come across as eccentric knots. In addition to those features, the single "odd tuft" knots show up here and there, but I don't think they are necessarily essential to the Senneh loop technique; rather, I believe they have merely become a customary embellishment to Tibetan pile weaving. Anyway, I'm not aware of a recognized distinction between "workshop" weaving in Tibet or Nepal and cottage or tribal weaving. The article in Emmett Eiland's book I mentioned above suggests that certain elements in the Tibetan social and cultural framework sort of re-invented pile weaving towards the latter part of the twentieth century; or at least re-invented key components of it, such as natural dyeing.

The prominent separation of the pile along horizontal lines noted by Dinie is a feature of many Tibetan rugs. I don't think it results specifically from the use of the metal rod itself so much as it does from of the way the weft lines end up when the Senneh loop technique is employed. The following diagrams are from Murray Eiland’s book, Chinese and Exotic Rugs.



I don’t pretend to understand how the rugs are woven, and these explanations are over my head. But they do demonstrate that the resulting “knots” are not going to lie as uniformly as do knots in conventionally woven rugs. The effect can be seen either from the back of the rug or by peering into the folded back pile. Following is my saddle rug with a close image of such an exposed row.





The separation lines can be seen on the saddle rug (running vertically due to the orientation of the image). If you look carefully at the close-up image below it, you will see warp lines running vertically across the top of the wefts, for example, the spot just to the left of center where the red (on the left) is divided from the green (on the right). In fact, these warp lines are evident in this way at every separation of the knots, and a fairly substantial weft lies under them, almost like a packing weft in a Bijar. I believe this arrangement of foundation elements in the Senneh loop technique results in the distinctive horizontal pile breaks in Tibetan rugs. I tried unsuccessfully to achieve a photo that illustrated this phenomenon more clearly.

I tried to illustrate the funkiness of the knotting a little better, too, as it is more evident with the rug in one's hand. But you can get the idea. The buff colored knot on the left side with the angled node is an example. It is part of the Senneh loop technique. The third knot to the right of the group of four red is another, and the far right red knot in that group is skinnier than the others. The green node to the right of the line of green at the center is an example of one of the single tufts inserted in the weave. I wasn't able to provide an image of the back, as the piece is lined with fabric (a common treatment of these pieces).

This piece I've illustrated is one that I would have had some trouble not assigning to China if it weren't for the tell-tale weave.

Rich Larkin
August 14th, 2009, 01:41 PM  24
Dinie Gootjes
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Thanks, Rich. I will have to look at those pictures longer before I understand, if I ever will. But your illustration of the weaving characteristics from your saddle shows what to look for. I would have gone for Chinese too.

Richard, aigu, pangapsumnida. We lived in Busan more or less throughout the eighties. As for antiques, you were there too late. With the improvement of the economy in the late eighties and the nineties came a surge of interest in the country's own past and the means to indulge that interest. Prices went up and the supply down. Halfway our stay there, we bought 4 saucer-like dishes from a 2 feet high stack in the back of the proverbial dark and dusty antique store. The owner said they were Koryo period (918-1392). We were not sure whether to believe him, but we liked them. We later showed them to the director of a museum specializing in ceramics in Holland. She looked them over for a long time, then asked how much we had paid for them. The equivalent of 13 dollars each. "Oh, then they are no doubt genuine. Not even there could they make such perfect fakes for that price." But enough about Korea. No rugs there, alas. If Steve would be so kind as to give you my email address we can reminisce in peace. If you or another Turkotekker ever visit the area around Toronto, come over for my bulgogi. My penance for going off-topic.

Dinie
August 14th, 2009, 04:14 PM  25
Dinie Gootjes
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Rich, if you want my email address, could you contact Steve?

Dinie
August 17th, 2009, 01:43 PM   26
Marvin Amstey
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I finally have a chance to fill in the details about the door rug. It has quite a presence! It has a typical Tibetan knot with 32 per sq in. The tiger stripes are an undyed, charcoal grey, natural wool. The warp is hand spun wool as is the weft. While there is no abrash in the blue (not sure why there would be since it is not used much), there is in the reddish-maroon ground color. All the "white" is simply undyed sheep's wool. The wool is soft but has limited luster and has a moderate amount of kemp. All the colors look good to my eye, but we all know how unreliable that test is. In the presence of the saddle that I showed which has outstanding wool and a modern Tibetan (Nepalese) rug, it holds its own and fits right in.
August 17th, 2009, 06:46 PM   27
Dinie Gootjes
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Hi Marvin,

You don't seem to be getting much further with your inquiries about the inscription on your rug. If you go to http://www.tibet.com/, you will find in the side bar a list of Tibetan shops and restaurants etc. If you contact one of those, they might be able to help you.

Dinie
August 17th, 2009, 07:17 PM   28
Marvin Amstey
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Actually I have some more info that I forgot to include. A Tibetan employee of Chris Walters (Yayla, in Cambridge) translated it into Chinese and then into English. It comes out as "wood", "iron". Apparently it has something to do with the Tibetan/Chinese calendar. Unfortunately no one could explain that symbolism. I also learned that the inscription is in mirror image. This happens not infrequently when a weaver (illiterate) copies a design or another rug. It is particularly evident in Anatolian rugs where the pile goes in the opposite direction from the design.
August 18th, 2009, 08:54 AM  29
richard tomlinson
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hi all

marvin,

i am probably showing my ignorance here BUT .....

i am not sure what it is but there is something about this rug that doesn't feel quite right.

the word 'fake' could spring to mind but one would be asking "why a fake tibetan piece, given the lowly status of these rugs compared with other types?"

in addition, i have seen SO few tibetan door rugs with which to compare that it's hard to assess.

it's just the design that is worriesome. for example - the design at the top ( the hooked devices ) seem truncated compared with the other examples shown. they lack a 'refinement'.

the 'window' style box with the inscription. odd.

the rigid, almost contrived design. a tiger rug mixed in with a door rug? odd. even the small cross elements are perfect in colour arrangment.

i have my doubts. i wish someone with vastly more experience would step in and say something.........

richard tomlinson
August 18th, 2009, 09:17 AM   30
Marvin Amstey
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Richard,
I understand your misgivings. I had (?have) them too, but it is not a fake. The construction and the use of lesser wool just points to a crude village product. However, the weaver was no amateur. Everything is laid out in perfect scale. While the hooked devices are shortened, that seems logical in order to make room for the inset cartouche. I don't think we'll know much more. A good translation of the script might help.
August 19th, 2009, 10:00 AM   31
Dinie Gootjes
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Hi Marvin,

If the inscription means 'wood' and 'metal', these are two of the Five Elements, which, in combination with a series of animals are used to indicate years, months, days and hours in China and neighbouring countries. These are then used in Chinese astrology to find out auspicious dates or combinations, e.g. for marriage. Basically the same calendar is used in Tibet. I don't know what this combination means. Not one particular year, for to denote a year, you would have a form of one of the five elements in combination with an animal. Two elements could indicate the year and month of birth of a person maybe, or the year elements of two persons/a couple? But here I am speculating. I think I am on firm footing with the two words indicating two elements and the link to the calendar though. See Wikipedia under 'Chinese astrology", 'Five elements', Chinese calendar', 'Tibetan calendar' etc. Maybe this gives you a framework to understand when somebody with more knowledge can give a more precise explanation.

Dinie
August 19th, 2009, 11:36 AM   32
Richard Larkin
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Hi Marvin, Dinie, et al,

Dinie, that's fascinating stuff. One would have to take the results of an analysis with a grain of salt, as we see that the inscription was woven backwards, and thus probably copied from something else. Nevertheless, I hadn't encountered this sort of inscription/date situation on any rug, and would be interested to see what could be gleaned from what's there by following the approaches mentioned. Marvin, if you do come up with any insights along the lines Dinie suggested, I hope you'll share them, even if they have to be tentative.

Another comment is probably stating the obvious about your rug. There is a lot about your piece that reflects certain Chinese rugs, and tiger stripe types in particular, having to do with color and the use of the colors. I'm referring in particular to the two shades of yellow and the use of light and dark indigo in that manner shown surrounding the inscription cartouche. The salmon shade is also familiar in some kinds of Chinese rugs, though not so much in the tiger pelt ones, in my experience. These respetive colors aren't necessarily spot on with their Chinese analogs, but it seems to me that the choice of them in the rug indicates a kinship with a Chinese tradition.

Marvin, forgive me if you've covered this issue earlier in the thread, but I would like to know what your thoughts are about the possible age of your rug.

Rich Larkin
August 20th, 2009, 10:32 AM  33
Marvin Amstey
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I have been in touch with a Tibetan organization in Ithaca, NY - Snowlion - and several Tibetan natives looked at this. One also came up with the wood and iron (the first person who made that interpretation was a Tibetan employee of Chris Walters at Yayla) with the same general explanation about its use in astrology and the calendar but not a date. They also told me that not all the characters are backward. They surmised that the script was copied imperfectly by an illiterate weaver.

My estimate of age is based purely on the knowledge that I've gained from the written sources referred to in an earlier post and conversation with other Tibetan and Chinese collectors and my judgment of the dyes used. The presence of a woolen warp and weft, according to Eiland, is not a good gauge of age, although many of us thought that it was. All of the dyes seem to be good ones except, perhaps, the maroon ground. There are a few small areas of dye running off onto the foundation. However, my eye suggests this is an example of poorly washed wool and not an aniline dye since most of the edges are free of this. I believe that this dye is madder, but it requires a chem lab to prove it. It reminds me of poorly washed wool used in some Turkmen pieces where the dyes had been analyzed, yet some running occurred. The abrash in this color is obvious.

The large, chunky knots in this rug are very much like the large knots in a truly old Chinese rug (Ming). However, in my rug they are tied in a typical Tibetan fashion and not Chinese. The door rug is NOT from the Ming times. Having said all this, I have no idea how old it is . I do believe that this rug was made before WWII. It could have been made before 1900, but here we are all speculating.
August 20th, 2009, 02:59 PM   34
Marvin Amstey
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A little more info:
The dealer in Beijing from where I obtained this rug told me today that he acquired the rug from a Lama of a western Chinese Tibetan temple 4 years ago. The Lama was a relative of his friend. The Lama stated that the script is a Buddhist incantation not interpretable by the Han Chinese (or non-believers as he intimated). I'm not sure that any of this helps. Are non-practicing Tibetans not privy to the incantations of praying monks? Are the Tibetan people with whom I spoke (who are American citizens, or at least have a green card) unable to read or understand the lamist incantation? Help me out folks!
August 20th, 2009, 04:40 PM  35
Dinie Gootjes
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Hi Marvin,

Some possibilities:

- The lama knew that "a Buddhist incantation not interpretable by the Han Chinese" would sell better than "the script was copied imperfectly by an illiterate weaver"

- if it is indeed an incantation, written imperfectly or not, the meaning of the words, possibly two of the five elements used in astrology, may be so strongly decided by their context, that meaningful translation is impossible, unless one knows the jargon so to speak. It may very well be that the words are 'wood' and 'metal', but unless you are able to find another lama or someone intimately familiar with the Tibetan version of Buddhism, it may not be possible to find out what they stand for in this context. That would explain how your informants with green cards knew what the words were, but could not explain the message. They did not have their Buddhist cards.

This is not quite as improbable as it sounds. In one of the houses we lived in while in Korea, we found a dirty piece of paper glued to an iron hoop. The lady who worked for us, told us that it was an incantation to keep away the evil spirits from the house. Nobody was able to tell us what it said on the piece, there were Chinese characters there, but nobody could make sense of it. We did not have the right kind of connections .

Dinie
August 20th, 2009, 05:59 PM   36
Richard Larkin
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Hi folks,

It's most interesting that an inscription like this one, that is so prominently showcased and, apparently, articulated quite carefully, would be seen by native users of the language to be ineptly written. In garbled inscriptions on Middle Eastern rugs, the item is usually an incidental or throwaway detail and looks like scribbling. In this instance, it might be said the whole rug is about the inscription. If it were consistently in reverse, the explanation of copying from the back of the rug would explain it, but it seems only parts are in reverse.

As far as the meaning is concerned, Dinie may have her finger on something in her first note. Just one more tall story to make the rug more desirable. In a nearby thread, Marla took the trouble to point out to us that most weavers ared ordinary people who look at things pretty much the same as you and me, though they appear romantic and exotic from a distance. Maybe it's the same with Lamas, at least if they have rugs for sale.

Rich Larkin
August 20th, 2009, 11:14 PM  37
Marvin Amstey
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On a political level, I'm not sure that a Tibetan Lama wants a Han Chinese to understand. On our level, its simply a rug that one enjoys - or not.
August 21st, 2009, 12:00 AM   38
Derek Dyckman
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Hi Folks,

I was told at one point point that the truk or Tibetan secular cloth design was primarily a 'post Younghusband' implementation into Tibetan rug iconography. The script window, to my eyes, looks more proper & readable noninverted.

Derek

Last edited by Derek Dyckman; August 21st, 2009 at 12:07 AM.
August 21st, 2009, 02:26 AM   39
Filiberto Boncompagni
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Marvin,
Quote:
On a political level, I'm not sure that a Tibetan Lama wants a Han Chinese to understand.
Perhaps it means Hans go home.
Hypothetically,

Filiberto