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Brocade
broche carpet. A wool carpet of clipped and looped pile. Patterning is provided by the clipped areas. See “cut-and-loop.”
broken border. A border which is not confined by a straight line around the field. The border design may occasionally penetrate the field or a field design may break into the border. Some Kerman rugs, some French rugs, and some Chinese rugs have such borders.
Broken border (Chinese rug detail) Jason Nazmiyal
Brousa. See “Bursa.”
Brousse. See “Bursa”
brown. In Near Eastern weavings, this color may be produced by a variety of natural dyes or, more rarely, it may be the natural brown color of sheep’s wool. Vegetable dyes for brown include oak bark and acorn cups, walnut husks and pomegranate rind. Cutch or catechu (the heartwood and pods of an Asiatic tree) is a brown dye used in Far Eastern weavings. Like black, natural brown dyes embrittle wool and produce etching when used with an iron mordant. See “etching.”
Brusa, Brussa. See “Bursa.”
Brussels. A power-loomed carpet in which extra warps are looped around wires in the weaving process. If the loops are left uncut, the rug is termed “Brussels.” In some looms, the wire is grooved and a knife, running down the groove, cuts the loops to form cut pile. In this case, the rug is termed “Wilton.” The Brussels carpet process was developed in Brussels in about 1710.
Bucharest. A trade designation of quality for contemporary Romanian rugs with cotton foundation and a knot count of about 70 knots per square inch.
buckles. Ridges or wrinkles in a carpet due to improper installation or weaving faults. See “cockle,” “cornrowing,” and “grinning.”
buckthorn. Rhamnus petiolaris. The unripe berries of this shrub produce a yellow dye with an alum mordant.
Buckthorn
Buddha’s Hand, foshou. An Asiatic fruit, citrus medica, whose form suggests a hand. It is sometimes represented in Chinese and Tibetan rugs and symbolizes wealth and honor.
Buddha’s Hand
Buddhist symbols. A collection of eight “precious things” or “treasures” symbolic of good fortune and emblematic of Buddhism. They are used singly or collectively as motifs in Chinese and Tibetan rugs. The symbols are the wheel, conch, umbrella, canopy, lotus, vase, fish and Ch’ang or endless knot. See entries under these names. See “Confucian symbols” and “Taoist symbols.”
Bukhara, Bokhara. A city of Uzbekistan populated by Uzbeks and Tajiks. The city is a source of suzanis woven by Tajiks. Turkmen rugs are erroneously referred to as “Bokharas.”
Bulgaria, Thrace. A country of southeast Europe. Bulgaria was a source of nineteenth-century rugs made in imitation of the Gördes prayer rug. Bulgaria is a minor source of contemporary pile rugs with floral designs based on Persian models. These rugs are woven in Kotel and Panagiurishte. Bulgarian kilims are sometimes referred to as “Thracian.” The slit-weave tapestry structure is most common. Red is dominant and colors are stronger than those of Turkish kilims. Nineteenth-century sources of kilims include these towns: Berekovica, Chiprovtsy, Gabrovo, Kotel, Samokov, Şarköy, Sliven, Sumen, Teteven, and Zaribrod. There are some antique kilims with Bulgarian inscriptions. West Bulgarian kilims are finely woven and employ curvilinear wefts. East Bulgarian kilims are more coarsely woven, with darker colors than those from the west, and they are more like Anatolian kilims. Contemporary kilims are woven in Chiprovtsi. See “Cerga,” “Kotel,” and “Şarköy.”
Bulgarian kilim (detail) Kazim Yildiz
buli. In Bangladesh, memorized verbal instructions for the creation of a specific pattern by a weaver. See “talim.”
Bulvardi, Balvardi, Bolvardi. A subtribe of the Qashqa’i. They reside near Shiraz in southwest Iran. See “Qashqa’i.”
Bünyan. See “Kayseri.”
Burdur. A town of western Anatolia and a source of rugs in designs based on Persian models with modern colors. Knot densities are about 130 knots per square inch on a cotton foundation. The asymmetric knot is used.
Burdur rug (detail) Yurdan
burling. Inspecting and repairing newly-woven factory-produced rugs. More specifically, hand-tufting void areas that occur in power-loomed rugs.
burning. When caustic solutions are used to fade a rug, an excessively strong solution may fuse some wool fibers in the pile. This condition is termed “burning.”
burn test. Used to determine the type of fiber in rugs. A very small sample is exposed to flame. Bright burning, the smell of burning paper, and a fragile, fine ash indicate cotton. Barely sustains flame, strong odor of burning hair, and ash in an elongated ball indicate wool. Does not sustain flame, indistinct smell, and small ash ball indicate silk.
Burnt Water. See “Pine Springs.”
Bursa, Brusa, Brousse, Prusa. A town of northwest Anatolia, south of Istanbul. Bursa was the first capital of the Ottoman Empire and Ottoman court rugs may have been woven there in the late sixteenth century. In the nineteenth century, Bursa was the source of rugs made in imitation of the Gördes prayer rug. Silk production from Bursa is used in contemporary Turkish rugs.
buta. See “boteh.”
butterfly. In Chinese rugs, the butterfly symbolizes marital bliss.
Chinese butterflies
butterfly saddle rugs. Tibetan saddle rugs woven in a trapezoidal shape. The corners of the shorter parallel edge may be rounded. The overall shape suggests a butterfly with spread wings.
Butterfly saddle rug Jason Nazmiyal
button rugs. Rugs made by taking a fabric disk, folding it in quarters, and stitching the point to a backing material. This was an early American method for home-made rugs.
C
Cabbbage roses in a Karabagh rug Jason Nazmiyal
cabbage rose. A rug motif based
