Posted by Randy Crist on June 30, 1999 at 22:37:52:
In Reply to: Re: Try #2 for image posted by michael david on June 30, 1999 at 20:53:50:
Actually, I think that this bag is much older than that, perhaps woven in the third quarter of the 19th century. My reasons: The wool quality, which I failed to mention, is fantastic and the color saturation is equally great. I don't necessarily think that these qualities guarantee great age, but they seem to be excellent, and accepted, indicators. You don't see both of these on post-1900 pieces very often. The purple (a really good one, by the way) would be an unusual color for a late bag. The other colors-a very bold yellow-gold, super saturated dark green and reds, are out of the ordinary for turn of the century items. It doesn't have the handle of something from the 20th century or even late 19th. It doesn't fit with the pieces from that period, which are numerous and reasonably well documented. The child-like drawing, to me, is not an indiciator of age. There are pieces that have similar primitive design from all periods of South Persian tribal weaving. So my conclusion is it is either 1) a very "old" piece-before 1875 isn't unreasonable-relative to other S. Persian pieces; or, 2) a really weird unexpected thing. I lean towards #1. Others who know a heck of a lot more than I do, came to the same conclusion.
The trouble with the above paragraph is that it contains the same kind of problematic analysis that Yon talks about in his introduction-quality plus some other factors equals age. Does anyone have "better" reasons for or against my conclusion?
Regards,
Randy