Posted by Wendel Swan on March 31, 1999 at 06:49:31:
In Reply to: Re: Woven Bags and Mosque Donations posted by Steve Price on March 30, 1999 at 11:43:32:
We know more about the history of Turkish carpets than any other group because of the practice of donating carpets to mosques in Turkey. However, we know very little about how tribal artifacts may have been preserved.
Recent C-14 tests of Turkmen rugs, for instance, suggest dates back to the 15th Century, yet we cannot establish a provenience for them.
Parviz Tanavoli is systematically searching for 18th Century Persian rugs, an important group of weavings that are almost completely undocumented. Although the Persians undoubtedly wove substantially during the 18th Century, Iranian mosques today are covered only with the inexpensive but practical zilus. Great old carpets have simply not been found in modern times within the Persian mosques, even though not all of them have been looted.
Most societies have some method of "banking" their wealth. We know about the Turkish mosques and Saul correctly points out that dowries served a purpose in perpetually the wealth of wool. However, preservation through dowries probably have very limited application over the centuries - especially for nomads.
Wendel