Textile fragment with squares and hexagons
Details
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Title
Textile fragment with squares and hexagons
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Associated place
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Date
15th century (1401 - 1500)
Mamluk Period (1250 - 1517) -
Material and technique
linen, embroidered with blue, green, and yellow silk; pulled-thread openwork; with rolled hems in flax
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Material index
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Technique index
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Object type
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Dimensions
26 x 16 cm max. (length x width)
along length/width 17 / 24 threads/cm (thread count)
embroidery bands 4.5 cm (width)
ground fabric 0.05 cm (thread diameter)
additional fibre, embroidery 0.06 cm max. (thread diameter)
additional fibre, embroidery 0.04 cm min. (thread diameter) -
No. of items
1
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Credit line
Presented by Professor Percy Newberry, 1941.
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Museum location
Museum department
Eastern Art
Accession no.
EA1984.446
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Catalogue text
Like No.57 [EA1984.445.a], this band is the central one of three worked on a scarf. It combines some features already seen on Nos.56 [EA1984.472] and 57 [EA1984.445.a], with the elongated hexagon and horizontal Z within diamond shapes. It is another example of the skilful way designers rearranged the same motifs and patterns. The addition of a third colour has resulted in a particularly attractive embroidery, and the openwork ground contrasts well with the satin stitch motifs.
Although both these bands are from scarf ends, the same embroidery was probably worked on covers, towels and light furnishings such as curtains. There is an impressive large hanging covering the wall in the background of Marziale's painting, Supper at Emmaus (Accademia Galleries, Venice), decorated with vertical bands of geometric patterns featuring Z-shapes within elongated hexagons and pseudo-kufic letters.In: Ellis, Marianne, Embroideries and Samplers from Islamic Egypt (Oxford: Ashmolean Museum, in association with Greenville: Curious Works Press, 2001)
Three parallel bands, one very fragmentary, containing squares and hexagons. The squares have a blue horizontal S-shape and two stylized yellow trefoils, embroidered in satin stitch. The hexagon contains two rhombic shapes embroidered in green satin stitch, and a frame and horizontal angular S-shape embroidered in pulled work with yellow wrapping stitch in horizontal rows. On either side of the hexagon are triangles embroidered in blue satin stitch.
The bands are 4.5 cm wide and set 6.5 cm apart. Two sides of the textile have rolled hems, and the bands are at right angles to them.In: Barnes, Ruth and Marianne Ellis, ‘The Newberry Collection of Islamic Embroideries’, 4 vols, 2001, Oxford, Ashmolean Museum
Further reading
Barnes, Ruth and Marianne Ellis, ‘The Newberry Collection of Islamic Embroideries’, 4 vols, 2001, Oxford, Ashmolean Museum, vol. iii, vol. i
Ellis, Marianne, Embroideries and Samplers from Islamic Egypt (Oxford: Ashmolean Museum, in association with Greenville: Curious Works Press, 2001), no. 58 on p. 87, illus. p. 87
Reference URL
