Posted by Wendel Swan on November 25, 1998 at 07:38:09:
In Reply to: Animal pelt? posted by Steve Price on November 25, 1998 at 06:16:09:
The simplicity of the elements in the salatchak makes it possible to imagine virtually any representation (including a pelt) or to see none. The only "objects" I see here are the architectural elements I referred to earlier: the niche at the top and the two rectangles at the bottom. I don't spot a leopard.
One analogous rug that I did not originally include in my references because it is not shaped is #22 at page 71 of Peter Hoffmeister, Turkoman Carpets in Franconia, Crosby Press, Edinburgh, 1980.
Hoffmeister attributes this small (117 x 74cm) flatwoven prayer design rug to the Tekke. It has a mihrab within a mihrab layout. The white ground is filled with diagonal rows of star-like motifs which can be read, among other possibilities, as forming an ascending pattern, not unlike the salatchak under discussion.
The Hoffmeister rug is also exceedingly simple, but a bit more regular in execution than our subject. Perhaps Hoffmeister's functioned as a cradle textile. It also is too small for adult prayer use.
Wendel