Posted by Erol Abit on June 21, 1999 at 15:50:00:
In Reply to: Re: Dating Turkomen weavings posted by Jim Allen on June 21, 1999 at 03:29:41:
:..because the carpets mostly sit in rooms with poor conditions as moth bait while the big Mosques all have machine made carpet on the floor. There is still a lot of great classical pieces in Turkey because of their culture of appreciation and the social act of donating pieces to mosques.
Is this a general or a personal thought? My observation with only two eyes without forgetting about other millions of eyes does not tell that donating rugs to mosques does not cause rugs to preserve better than keeping them in the houses. Why? First, because the rugs have not been donated to be hanged on the walls but just to lay on the floors where many dirty and smelling socks walk over the rugs. (not the necked feet, of course, because they are washed before entering the mosque but soaks are not washed). On the other hand, most of the handwoven rugs in houses are being kept in stores as heirlooms and the naphtalene is periodically put in the layers of folded rugs for moths. I believe, the preserved rugs in good conditions we see today are these rugs which are kept in the houses but not the rugs in mosques. However, I have to repeat that I have only two eyes.
:The sad fact is that most great Turkoman material has been far worse damaged by western vacumn cleaners and cleaning practices than centuries in their native lands. Jim
I don't understand how vacuum cleaners can give more damage to rugs than by native methods, which are the cleanings by brooms made with straw(?). Vacuum cleaners are sucking the piles of rugs? Where is Nathan?
E. Abit