roses tend to dwarf any other elements in the design. Examples may be found in Savonnerie rugs, mid-nineteenth-century Turkish rugs (Mejidian style) and nineteenth-century rugs of Karabagh and Kuba. See “farangi gul” and “rose motif.”
Cabistan, Kabistan. A term of controversial origin formerly used as an attribution for some Caucasian rugs. There is no such geographical location, and there are no certain structural or design features associated with rugs so attributed. This attribution is no longer used.
cabled, cable twist, cord. When plied yarns are plied again, the resulting yarn may be described as a “cable” or “cabled.” Heavy cabled wefts every 3 to 8 inches are used in some Mashhad carpets and Dragon carpets. These wefts are clearly visible from the back of the rug and may appear as lines of wear on the front. Cabled yarns are often used in selvages. See “ply.”
cable weft. When warps are offset or depressed, wefts are alternately straight or bending in their passage through the warps. The straight and tight weft is termed a “cable” weft and the bending weft is termed a “sinuous” weft. In some rugs, the cable weft is much thicker than the sinuous weft, thus forcing the warps apart so that the thinner sinuous weft must bend. See “thari.”
cable weft
Caesarea. See “Kayseri.”
Cairene carpets. Floral and Mamluk carpets attributed to Cairo, Egypt of the fifteenth through seventeenth centuries. These carpets are constructed with the asymmetric knot and S-spun and Z-plied yarns. See “Egypt,” “Mamluk,” “Ottoman floral carpets,” and “para-Mamluk.”
Cairene carpet (detail)
Çal. A town of southwest Anatolia where kilims and brightly colored, coarsely knotted rugs are woven.
Çal kilim (detail) Kazim Yildiz
Calcutta (now Kolkata). A city of eastern India on the Bay of Bengal. In the nineteenth century, Calcutta jail served as a collection center for rugs and dhurries woven by prisoners of other jails in India.
calligraphy. See “Arabic calligraphy and script.”
calyx. The outermost floral parts or sepals forming a cup shape. These may be shown in stylized cross section in oriental rug designs. See “Afshan” and “Rhodian lilly.”
Çamardı, Maden. A town of south central Anatolia and the source of rugs sold as “Maden.” These are prayer rugs with a red field.
camel hair. The wool or hair of the camel is used rarely in pile rug weaving and kilims. Camel hair is distinguished from wool by its fineness and pigmentation granules. The term may refer to the color of sheep wool. See “shotori.”
Campeche wood. See “Logwood.”
Çan. A town of northwestern Anatolia where rugs are woven. These rugs usually have a rust red field and green spandrels. See “Turkey.”
Çanakkale. Turkish for “pottery castle.” A town and district of northwest Anatolia, located on the Dardanelles. Rug weaving is an ancient craft in Çanakkale, some examples from the area having been woven in the fifteenth century. Rugs of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries are coarsely woven on a wool foundation with red wefts. Knot densities are about 40 to 80 symmetric knots per square inch. The number of wefts varies between rows of knots. Ends are usually a red plain weave. Within the rug trade, these rugs may be termed “Bergama.” See “Turkey.”
Çanakkale rug Simon Knight
cane pattern. A pattern of repeated stripes, each occupied by some repeated motif.
Cane patterns
canopy or standard motif. A Buddhist symbol of official authority sometimes used as a motif in Chinese rugs.
Canopy
Cappadocia. A province of central Anatolia. The town of Avanos in Cappadocia produces prayer rugs with a red field and an ornate suspended lamp. These rugs have many borders. Formerly there were Greek rug-weaving workshops in Avanos. See “Turkey.”
carbon dating rugs. Naturally occurring radio carbon 14 decays at a fixed rate. Atmospheric carbon 14 is continuously created through cosmic ray bombardment. Accordingly, the relative quantity of radio carbon 14 in samples protected from the atmosphere or bound in organic matter for long periods differs from that in the present atmosphere. By comparing the relative amounts of carbon 14 in protected samples with atmospheric carbon 14, the age of organic matter, including animal fibers can be calculated. This method is useful in dating objects up to about 60,000 years old. The age of the Pazyryk carpet, the Shroud of Turin, and many other ancient textiles was determined through radiocarbon 14 dating. See “archeological sites,” “dating rugs,” and “Pazyryk carpet.”
carding. To comb fibers prior to spinning with cards or brushes having wire bristles. Woolens are wool yarns that have been spun from carded wool. In the Near East, wool may be carded with a bow, its vibrations aligning the fibers. See “worsted.”
Carding brushes
Carding by bowing (India)
carminic acid. The essential red dye pigment of cochineal. See “cochineal.”
carnation motif. The carnation is commonly used as a motif in oriental rugs, particularly in Turkey. It appears in naturalistic renderings in Mughal carpets and it is a geometricized motif in the field of certain rugs of Kuba, in Persian rugs and Kurdish meander borders.
Carnations
Mughal
Turkish
carnation border. A meandering vine border of reversing fan-shaped carnation flowers, each separated by a diagonal leaf. This border may be more or less geometricized. It is a very common border found on rugs throughout the Middle East, including rugs of India.
Carnation border
çarpana (Turk.). Tablet weave. See “tablet weaving.”
carpet. Any fabric floor covering. Some make a distinction
