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A field
is the large area in the center of the rug containing the main pattern and
designs. The color on which the design is arranged is called the field
color. The field patterns can be broadly classified into seven categories:
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Medallion:
They may appear in many different styles, sizes and number. A
central medallion may be superimposed on a field that is either left
empty or filled with a repeated motif or an overall pattern.
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Repeated Motif:
A rug is said to have a repeated motif design when the field is
filled with multiple rows of the same motif. This type of design is
often found combined with the medallion design.
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Allover Pattern:
The allover pattern has a field filled with a number of motifs that
are neither a repeated nor a regimented form. The pattern may
contain palmmettes and flowers along with a network of wines and
tendrils as in the famous Shah Abbas pattern. Alternatively a vase,
tree, garden and other patterns may be also used.
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Open Field:
Open field rugs contain a large expanse of a solid color in the
field surrounded by a series of borders. Open field design rugs are
frequently produces in Talish, Kazak, Tibet, Nepal and Sultanabad,
etc.
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Panel: The field of a panel design rug contains compartmentalize design
divided into square, rectangular, onion dome, diamond shaped,
lattice or trellis patterns. Besides these, a variety of motifs like
flowers, trees, buteh, stars, palmettes, etc. may also be used.
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Portrait:
Portrait rugs began to appear by the end of the 18th
century. In these, the field depicts landscapes, historic monuments
or events, scenes from daily life or folk-lore and even copies of
famous European paintings.
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Prayer:
Prayer rugs often have a
prayer niche (mehrab) or arch at the top of the field. Religious
motifs like stars and urns may also appear. The designs may be
curvilinear or rectilinear depending upon where the rug was woven.
Some popular motifs used in oriental rugs are booteh, herati, Zil-i-Sultan,
Mina Khani, Gul-i-Henna, Gul-i-Franc, Gul and Memling Gul.
The
borders of an oriental rug are made of series of bands running
along its perimeter, surrounding the field. The bands may number upto ten
or more. They usually consist of repeated motifs like flower, rosettes,
stars and geometric motifs etc. They occasionally may contain inscriptions
in Persian, Armenian, Hebrew, Sanskrit, Arabic or other scripts depicting
poem, prayer, dedication or even the signature of the weaver.
The
edges
are usually the longer sides of the rugs. They are
finished in either of two ways, selvedge or overcast, to create a durable
finish. As mentioned earlier, an overcast is a group of warps wrapped with
a separate thread in circular fashion creating a rounded finish. A
selvedge is a single terminal warp or a cord formed of various terminal
warps is wrapped with the weft threads, forming an edge. In some areas,
the terminal warp threads are not wrapped by the wefts during the weaving
process. Instead, the side cord is added after the rug has been woven and
removed from the loom. A single cord is sewn on to the side of the rug. A
point to be noticed here is that in such cases, the edges rarely
matches perfectly.
The
two shorter sides of the rug are usually referred to as the
ends of the rugs. They may contain a flat woven area anywhere from an
inch to a foot deep. These are often the first parts of the rug to show
wear and tear
The
fringe is the exposed end of the warp, extending out of the ends. It
may be woven into flat area, or knotted, or braided, often in an unusual
way. In some rugs, the fringe may appear only on one end of the rug.
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