The Oriental Rug Part 1

The Oriental Rug.

by William D. Ellw.a.n.ger.

PREFACE

That Oriental rugs are works of art in the highest sense of the term, and that fine antique specimens, of even modest size, have a financial value of ten, fifteen, or thirty-eight thousand dollars, has been recently determined at public auction. At this auction, several nations had a representative voice in the bidding, and the standard of price was fairly established. The value of rugs may have been imaginary and sentimental heretofore; it is now a definite fact, with figures apparently at the minimum. What the maximum may prove, remains to be seen.

Choice old rugs, therefore, to-day come into the same cla.s.s with genuine paintings of the old Dutch School; with canvases of Teniers, Ruysdael, Cuyp, Ostade, or whatever similar artist's work may have escaped the museums. They vie in prestige with the finest examples of Corot, Diaz, Troyon, or Daubigny; and in monetary supremacy they overtop the rarest and grandest of Chinese porcelains.

And yet the Oriental rug, as against such compet.i.tors for the wealthy collectors' favour, has hardly a history, and is practically without a name or a pedigree. Experts will tell you at a glance whether or not your Wouverman is genuine, or inform you where every true Corot was owned or whence it was bartered or stolen. In Chinese porcelains, the knowing dealer will easily prove to you not only under what dynasty but in what decade or year a particular piece was produced.

The painting has descent, signature, or the brush mark of a school to father it. The Chinese vase, bowl, or jar has its marks, cyphers, stamps and dates, and an undoubted genealogy to vouch for its authenticity. The rug must speak for itself and go upon its intrinsic merits. It is its own guarantee and certificate of artistic and financial value.

The study of Oriental rugs, therefore, can never lead to an exact science or approximate dogmatic knowledge. Whoever is interested in them must needs rely upon his personal judgment or the seller's advice. There is practically only one current book authority in the premises.

A new volume on the subject would thus seem to be well justified. It is the hope of the author that this book may prove itself sound and practical, and that it may help to make more clear and simple the right appreciation of a valuable rug.

W. D. ELLw.a.n.gER

ROCHESTER, N.Y., 1903

The Oriental Rug

CHAPTER I

THE MYSTERY OF THE RUG

To judge of an Oriental rug rightly, it must be looked at from several points of view, or, at least, from two aspects; against the light and with the light. From the first standpoint, against the light of knowledge, speaking figuratively, there may be seen only a number of rude and awkward figures in crude colours scattered erratically on a dark or dingy-looking background, a fringe of coa.r.s.e and ragged strings at either end, and rough frays of yarn at the sides. This is what is accepted by many people as an Oriental rug. And indeed this is what most rugs are.

If, on the other hand, we view our rugs with the light of a better wisdom and happier experience, we will see the richest and softest of colours, the most harmonious shadings and blendings, medallions brilliant as jewels, or geometrical designs beautiful as the rose windows of a cathedral; or, again, graceful combinations of charmingly conventionalized flowers and delicate traceries and arabesques,--all these displaying new glories of ever changing and never tiring beauty. Each woven picture, too, is as soft to tread upon as a closely mown lawn, and caresses the feet that sink into its pile. These are Oriental rugs as their admirers know and love them.

Perhaps the chief charm of all such beautiful rugs is in their mystery.

Their designs are odd and strange and full of hidden meanings, and their effects are often evolved from the crudest and clumsiest figures, hooks and squares and angles; they owe their wealth of colour to simple vegetable dyes from the woods and fields and gardens, and yet the secret of many of these dyes is still a secret, or has long ago been lost. The places whence the rugs come, the people who make them and those who sell them, all are mysterious and hard to know and understand.

Moreover, broadly speaking, there are no experts on the subject, no authorities, no literature. He who would know them must learn them by experience. The rug dealers, for the most part, seem to treat their wares merely as so much merchandise, and what knowledge concerning them they are willing to impart is so contradictory as to be almost valueless. Few of them would agree upon the name of an example which might be out of the ordinary, or be able to tell where it was made. Ask of them what a "Mecca"

is, and they will stammer in their varying answers. And yet the Armenians who handle most of the rugs in this country are often highly educated, and fully appreciate the beauty of their wares. Their taste, however, is not always our taste, and all the Orientalists seem to retain their barbaric fondness for crude and startling colours. When we would turn to books for information in the matter we find that the authorities are not many. They might be numbered on your fingers and thumbs. These few books, moreover, have been published only in limited editions at high prices, and are not easily obtainable. One of the most important of such works is the sumptuously ill.u.s.trated, elephantine folio, issued in Vienna in 1892 by the Imperial and Royal Austrian and Commercial Museum. And, elaborate as this authority is, the modest editor, by way of apology, says in the preface that "no pretensions are made toward perfection owing to the little information that we can fall back upon." A recent authority on the subject is John Kimberly Mumford, and his volume on Oriental Rugs, published in 1900, has thrown much light on the subject. Too great praise cannot be given to this work and to his later studies in the same field.

Still, no one knows it all, and the mystery of Oriental rugs only deepens as we try to learn. The little that any one may really know of them through experience, through questioning and elusive answers, through conversations with obliging and polite vendors, and through foreign travel even, is, when all is said, only a patchwork of knowledge. Consider how stupendous and hopeless would be the task of one who would dare endeavour to a.n.a.lyze, criticise, cla.s.sify, and co-ordinate the paintings of the past five centuries, were no names signed to them or no appreciable number of pictures painted by the same known artist.

He who would write of rugs has a like condition to face.

And alas! also, whoever would write on this subject must now treat of it princ.i.p.ally as history. The characteristic rugs, the antique rugs, the rare specimens, are seldom to be bought. They are in museums, or in the hands of collectors who hold them in even a tighter fist.

Twenty years ago the warning was given that the choice old rugs were growing scarce; the years following found fewer still upon the market. Two or three years ago one of the largest wholesale houses in New York, carrying a stock of half a million or a million dollars, had no antiques to show. In the autumn of 1902, another large New York importer who had just returned from Persia, Tiflis, and Constantinople admitted that he had not brought back one valuable antique piece.

Nevertheless, the true enthusiast need not be discouraged. From wandering dealers, in odd corners, at the unexpected or by chance, one may happen on a choice specimen.

The very word "Persian" is a synonym for opulence, splendour, gorgeousness; and "Oriental" means beauty and wonder and the magic of the "Arabian Nights." From the Aladdin's cave of the mystical East, therefore, we may still hope to gather treasure and spoil.

CHAPTER II

GENERAL CLa.s.sIFICATION

Most of the rugs of commerce in this country come from Persia, Turkey, Asia Minor, Turkestan, the southern part of Russia, Afghanistan, and Beluchistan; a few also from India. The rugs are named from the provinces or cities where they are woven, and to the uninitiated, the names seem to have been as fearfully and wonderfully made as the rugs themselves. They are spelled one way on the maps and every other way in catalogues and advertis.e.m.e.nts. In enumerating the most familiar ones it may be well to write their names as nearly phonetically and conventionally as possible. A few rugs have trade appellations only, without regard to topography; and, often, unknown towns are called into requisition for fanciful t.i.tles to please the purchaser.

Of course the names of rugs may mean nothing to your man-of-all-work, whose duty it is to chastise them upon the lawn. But there is poetry in the names of the roses, and you cannot half enjoy their beauty unless you know a Mabel Morrison from the Baroness Rothschild; Cecile Brunner from the Earl of Dufferin; or can give the proper rank and t.i.tle to Captain Christy, General Jacqueminot, and Marechal Niel. And who would dare to talk of laces that could not give a French or Dutch or Irish name to them?

Or, when painted pictures instead of woven ones were under discussion, who would venture to admit that he had heard for the first time the names of some of the Old Masters, or did not know any of the Flemish School, or could not at least touch his hat to a Gainsborough or a Romney? There were "old masters" in wool as well as on canvas, as the Gheordez rugs most particularly prove, and though the artists' signatures are missing or meaningless, their cla.s.sification is important. Once learned, and then difficult to remember withal, rugs answer to their names like old and familiar friends. If Homer catalogued the ships, surely the masterpieces of the Eastern loom are worthy of brief nomenclature.

The Persians come first, and perhaps in the following order of excellence: Kirman, Sehna, Kurdistan, Khora.s.san, Serabend, Youraghan, Joshghan (Tjoshghan), Feraghan, Shiraz, Gulistan, Mousul, etc. The rug dealers frequently speak of a "Persian Iran," but as Iran is the native expression for Persia, the name is as tautological as are the dealer's laudatory adjectives. So far as the term "Iran" can be differentiated, it is now applied with some propriety to rare old Persian rugs of fine weave only, whose proper name may be in doubt.

Among the Turkish rugs, which are mainly those from Asia Minor, the Yourdez (or Gheordez), the Koulahs, Koniahs, and Ladiks are by far the finest, and then come the Bergamas, vying often for like high honour, the Melez, and many others which are vaguely cla.s.sed as Anatolians.

From Turkestan come the numerous Bokharas and the more uncommon Samarkands; from Afghanistan, the Afghans and the Khiva, and Yamoud-Bokharas. But the two rugs last named seem to have a doubtful paternity, and should perhaps be cla.s.sed with the other Bokharas.

Beluchistan sends but one type, which is generally unmistakable, although Afghans, Bokharas, and Beluchistans all have a family likeness.

To Caucasia in Russia are credited the Kabistans, Shirvans, Chichis (Tzi-tzis), Darbends, Karabaghs, Kazaks, and Gengias, also the Soumacs, or so-called Cashmeres. The first four of these are somewhat similar in character, and not many years ago were generally sold in this country under the indiscriminate t.i.tle of Daghestans. We are more specific in our knowledge now, and can cla.s.sify and differentiate an old Baku rug, or a Kuba, which is a Kubistan, and therefore what we used to call an antique Kabistan.

India provides us only with some fine large carpets mostly of modern make, and also with many imitations of Persian rugs, made in part by machinery like the current subst.i.tute for a Turkish towel.

CHAPTER III

OF THE MAKING, & OF DESIGNS, BORDERS, ETC.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

[Ill.u.s.tration: _"Serabend" Border_]

In order to appreciate the beauty of rugs, it is well to remember how they are made, and with what infinite patience the bits of wool are knotted onto the warp one after another, knot upon knot and tie after tie, until the perfect piece is finished. Yet, no! Finished it may be, but never perfect. Deliberately, if necessary, it must show some defect, in proof that Allah alone is perfect. Such at least is the poetical version of a crooked rug as the seller tells it. Yet never was a vendor but will expatiate fluently on the merits of a rug which lies true and straight and flat upon the floor, as a good rug should. It is a common sight nowadays in shop windows to see some wandering artisan plying his trade for the edification of the pa.s.ser-by. In his own home it is generally a woman who does the weaving, and very commonly the whole family take part in it. More often still the rugs were woven by an Oriental maid for her prospective dowry, and the practice yet obtains. A specimen of her handicraft in textile art was a bride's portion and marriage gift; it was considered as essential to the proceedings as the modern _trousseau_. This offering was a work of love and often a work of years. It is but natural, under such circ.u.mstances, with dreams, hopes, and fancies for inspiration, and the stimulus of rivalry, too, that masterpieces should result.

These Eastern marriage portions correspond to the "linen chest" of our ancestral Puritan Priscillas; and similar customs now survive in many countries. Except that the "accomplishment" of the Oriental maiden is so much more important, it might also be compared to the beadwork so diligently done by our grandmothers. If the Persian bride gave infinite toil and pains to innumerable knots and ties, our belles of the last century were also unwearying in their tasks, and strung more and smaller beads than any would care to count or finger now. The designs on these bead-bags were mostly crude and "homely," and their art was very simple.

But though the handiwork of the Orientals was expended in a better cause with worthier skill, both linen and wool, and even beads, bespoke a labour of love in such employments; which, alas! is out of date to-day.

Rugs of this character, gathered from house to house, together with some few stolen from mosque or palace, were the first ripe spoils of twenty years ago. Of course the supply was soon exhausted. It is an interesting question whether it might not be possible, in the East, to revive this high cla.s.s of work among the girls. Instead of establishing great factories for machine-made products from set designs, could not the most skilful of the girls be induced by good prices to create original pieces and rejuvenate the old art?