Animal rugs: facts

area rug

In the Stieglitz Museum in Leningrad is a magnificent specimen of an animal rug. It is of silk and the center of the field has a round medal­lion with curved edges.

The corner areas hold vines and playing among them are falcons and various birds. An interesting border is formed of inscriptions in cartouches.

Dr. F. Sarre in his "Rugs of the Middle Ages From Asia Minor and Spain" gives a picture and a description of an animal rug of the first half of the fifteenth century.

It is a fragment which was found by Dr. Bode in Rome** Two rigidly-conventionalized animal figures are repre­sented in each diamond-shaped lozenge, and seem to show the oft-recurring Chinese motif of the struggle between dragon and phcenix.