The Kufic border and the Peikam

[Martin Erik Andersen]

The following is cut outs of some of my perhaps speculative observations derived from a discussion on Turkotek.com regarding the design developments in some specific Turkmen Tekke Rugs. The discussion is archived here : http://www.turkotek.com/misc_00113/tekke.htm

This Tekke Torba published by Peter Hoffmeister is c14 dated to the 16th c. and thereby the oldest existing Torba:



It has a lot of interesting rare designs, one of them the border.
The border is called the Peikam border, and this border is by Pinner and Franses in Turkoman Studies I related to the kufic border.


Peikam border


The reference to the old Anatolian Seljuk carpets and the kufic borders (which Jim Allen also has pointed out) seems very straight forward. Here is some additional material I have found around on the web:


Seljuk 13th c.


Seljuk 13th c.


Seljuk 13th c.


Kufic, or Kufesque, border. Turkotek archive.


Vakıflar Carpet Museum, early 17th c.


Border close up


Peikam border

As I understand Pinner and Franses they conclude that the Turkmen peikam border is not a late derivation from Anatolian layout, but rather an independent or parallel development from an older source. That seems very plausible especially when one takes into account that the layout already on the Hoffmeister Torba seems stylistically finished, highly developed and refined into the specific Turkmen aesthetics (that perhaps even more independently than the Kochanak border?)

Of course it would be nice if developments in design and patterns went simply one-directional from one design to another. Probably that is not so, and of course a design variation may have multiple sources.
But if one of the peikam border’s sources is kufic, then one could speculate: Kufic is of course basically an Alphabet, and traditionally kufic ornamentation is in its roots words formed as ornaments.


Kufic calligraphy 14th. C Iran

In the square kufic alphabet they went to almost abstract patterns of symmetry and repetition, still writing.


Mausoleum of Sheikh Safi 14th. c Iran

The Kufic style of the Arabic alphabet seems to have been the common written alphabet from 8th - 11th c, after that it gets replaced in the handwritten texts, but still lives on in ornamental, calligraphic and decorative forms.



Some of these kufic ornamental writings are almost indecipherable, and are often supplemented with more readable cursive alphabet styles:






The Seljuk rugs are from the 13th c. where kufic ornamentation for already a long time had been an independent and highly stylized expression.



If the border on the early Seljuk rugs are made up of ornamental kufic letters (perhaps formalised in a coupled of generations of illiterate weavers) then what does(or did) the letters spell?
Perhaps the sole most important written word in Islamic culture: Allah




Sjeljuk 13th c.


Here are a few modernday version of caligrafic layouts of the word – just to illustrates to which length one today would go to make Gods name symmetrical:








Regarding the possible interpretation of the kufic ornament as “Allah” it is of course important that the Seljuk carpets are assumed to have been donated to the Alaeddin Mosque in Konya by Sultan Alaeddin Keykubad in 1221 where they have been placed until recent time. The Seljuk carpets are probably produced to the Mosque (or have at least been found worthy as a gift from a Sultan to a Mosque).

Even though it may be a bit of a side track, I cant help mentioning that Konya also were the home town of Mevlana Rumi from 1228 till his death in 1273, Rumi initiated the Mevlevi sufi order with their very strong emphasis on Dhikr - the Islamic devotional act involving the trance producing repetition of the names of God. Perhaps even the carpets themself could be seen as an expression of Dhikr.
And strange to think that Rumi might actually have seen, or even sat on these rugs.
I also do think I have read somewhere that the early Turkmen adopters of Islam where converted by sufi-missionaries (whatever that might have been at that time and place)




And Looking at some of the details of one of the kufic borders perhaps one can see the the word Allah written once more in a slightly less stylized form:





I would say that the way the kufic alphabet molds itself into ornamentation in general of course borrows layouts from earlier floral or geometrical ornamentation.
And I of course don't think that every kufic or kufesque ornament on later rugs should be interpreted as forms of the word Allah, I am only looking for design development and stylistic connections, here in a rather large perspective with gaps of centuries. But still the direct connection between the border on the early Seljuk carpets and the kufic alphabet to me seems very plausible. How that relates to later Turkmen rugs and the different border variations is of course a totally open question.


This is conventional called the kufic border in the rugs from a very large geographical area including both Caucasus and Persia:



This is a drawing of carved sandstone from Herat 15th c:



I am not quite sure (have to get an expert in Arabic kufic to confirm it) but I think the text says : “In the name of Allah, the merciful, the compassionate”. If that is correct then Allah is spelled in the right part of the ornament.

Turning it a 90 degrees , we certainly are very close to the Seljuk carpets :









Herat miniature 15th c.

Basically I personally think that the Seljuks brought something with them on their way to Anatolien, and that this something was merged and transformed into what they meet on their way - in a give and take, like all moving cultures always have done. The rugs are traces of a gigantic transforming melting pot of cultures between east and west. Perhaps the nomadic Turkmen tribes brought the pile rug (of course not blank, but with something on it), and merged it stylistical with the with the culture they meet, the ornaments of the architecture – and thereby also the ornamental kufic alphabeth.

Best
Martin


Peikam border, detail

[Barry]

As I think over the implications of Martin’s idea a few questions occurred. How do we even know that the Seljuk used Kufic. That one is rather simple. When the Seljuk converted to Islam Kufic was the main script used in the Quran. But to narrow it down even further we can look at:

Christie’s Lot 12 / Sale 7843
A SELJUK TALISMANIC SCROLL
EASTERN IRAN OR AFGHANISTAN, DATED MIDDLE OF RABI' I AH 535/END OF OCTOBER 1140 AD
A SELJUK TALISMANIC SCROLL
* £12,000 - £16,000 ($17,988 - $23,984)
Sale Information
Sale 7843
Art of the Islamic and Indian Worlds
13 April 2010
London, King Street
I feel the obvious answer is that as new converts to Islam the Seljuk would have a great familiarity with and reverence for “Allah” particularly in Kufic script.
More later…
Barry

[Martin Erik Andersen]

Hi Barry

That sure is an interesting scroll, fascinating ornamentation and calligraphy.

At the same auction there is a Seljuk silk Lampas robe fragment with roundels and mirrored inscriptions from 10-11th c:



It has a resemblance to a Siculo-Saracenic brocade from 11-12th c . This brocade has a 180 degree turned Kufic inscription in the border which reads "Arrahmãn" the Merciful, one of the bynames of Allah:



Both fragments are of course rather far from what one would stylistically connect with the Turkmen, but we have the mirrored animal/bird figurations centered by a tree/plant motif (which I suppose its agreed are a part of the internal layout of the Chuval Guls of the Torbas), and the basic pattern layout with roundels and cross sections.

Regarding these silk fragments I suppose it would also would be fair to mentioning the Sogdian silk roundels as a source (but that is of course a side track right now)

But basically these 2 fragments at least shows that kufic writting could be used as decorative mirrored border elements on textiles in the 12th c.

Best Martin

[Barry]

Hello Martin,
I saw the lampas robe fragment. My thought is that the man who wore that robe was an Oghuz Turkmen by descent. In the 10th and 11th centuries the primary difference between the Turkmen and the Seljuk was religion. They spoke the same language and shared a common ancestry. Even at the clan/tribe level they are intertwined. The Salor of Turkmenistan is the same group as the Salghurids who ruled Fars in the Il-Khanid period and the Salir who migrated to China in the 15th century.

I have been building my notes on the Seljuk and you can see them at:
http://baluch-rugs.com/History/People/Seljuk.htm

One line of thought that I have been contemplating is the role of elite sponsored production of rugs and art. The Seljuk rulers sponsored artists and artisans and produced goods for use, trade, and tribute. The Lampas cloth in the robe you cited is what I am talking about. Craftspeople made that for the nobleman. There would have been a designer/artist who created the design and then weavers who would execute the design. It is a small leap from robes to carpet borders so I think there is a court workshop element to the diffusion of Kufic design into Turkish carpets.

The questioned of sponsored production with Turkmen is not as clear cut. After the Oghuz Seljuk split the Turkmen confederated around the Salor and it is that Salor confederation that descended into the Turkmen of today. Did they too have a tradition og sponsored production? Over the years Jim Allen has speculated that they did.
Barry

[Martin Erik Andersen]

Found this modern day use of the calligraphic kufic inscription at http://campushookup.net/allahthelight/ :



The inscription here should be “Allah the Light of the Universe”. As far as I can decipher that puts the word ”Allah” like this in the Herat carving:



Thought I haven’t found a specific sample yet, this calligraphic way of creating ornamentations which slides into patterns surely must be pre-Seljuk

Best Martin

[Martin Erik Andersen]

Just for the fun of it, here is a basic kufic border drawing made up by mirroring the calligraphic version of the word Allah:

[Barry]

HTML clipboard Hello Martin,
Mirroring of calligraphy is to be expected in Persian court art. It is not to be expected in village or tribal weaving. So my take is that there must of been rug designs by court artists which were woven by Seljuk weavers and then copied for a very long time. This is perfectly reasonable for the Seljuk but I still don't quite get how the Turkmen first adapted unless they copied the Seljuk. As far as I can tell the salor were out of the artistic mainstream from the 11th to the 15th century.
Best wishes,
Barry

[Martin Erik Andersen]

Hi Barry

At least I have convinced myself that the kufic borders on the Seljuk carpets from Konya are ornamental versions of the word Allah But when that is said I must admit that the line of development and the chronology of it is very strange. Something is missing - which is of course not so strange as we are looking at only a handful of surviving rugs.

You have a good point that the Seljuk carpets may have been weaved on some kind of commission. I suppose the Seljuk/Turkmens didn’t carry out a total genocide and repopulation of the vast areas they conquered in the relatively short time of their expansion. They must have instituted themselves as a leading class, and taken use of local artisans. This in itself may have generated cultural and aesthetical syncretism. And as a result archaic Turkmen iconography or patterns could have been mingled up with the kufic letters.

A purely speculative interpretation, or simplification, could go like this:

Allah:


Rams Horn:


best Martin

[Martin Erik Andersen]

I wonder if there is any consensus about the possible origin of the animal rugs on the early European paintings?
The rug in The Marriage of the Virgin from 1423 by Gregorio di Cecco di Lucca has a border which is close to one of the Seljuk rugs.



best Martin

[Barry]

Hello Martin,
As best as I remember the animal carpet in the painting is just referred top as Turkish. That picture has surfaced several times in Hali but I don’t remember any special reference. If I can find it I would like to reread an article on early animal carpets. It seems to me it was in Hali in the late 90s about a rug in the Hecksher collection

I got to thinking about the role of carpets in Seljuk times. We at this point in the west tend to think about precious carpets, manuscripts, and like items as luxuries. Based on my studies I think that may be an inaccurate view at least before the 19th century in Southwest Asia. In their society there was very little cash money. The average man bartered for most of his needs and even taxes were paid in goods and services. For instance when the Salor paid their Taxes/Tribute to Khwarizm Shah it was 35,000 or 40,000 sheep per year. The local ruler or king then collected goods and over time that would be so unwieldy that the King would desire to trade up to smaller more valuable items. In Safavid times silk was important because of the high value to volume ratio. But in 1556 when Shah Tahmasp paid tribute to the Ottoman much of it was in books and carpet not silk.
Barry