Caucasian Shield Carpets’ by Robert Pinner and Michael Franses, published in 1978 in the inaugural issue of HALI magazine, remains to this day the definitive study of these 17th and 18th century carpets with variants of the classical shield palmette design.
Made possible by careful research and persistent ‘detective’ work, tThe late Dr Christine Klose’s reconstruction of the extent of a highly regarded design type of early Safavid ‘Hunting’ carpets through a comparative survey of known carpets and carpet fragments.
Carbon-14 dating has become the subject of intense debate in the antiques world – but how many people really know how it works or what it can and cannot determine? Dr Christine Prior of the Rafter Radiocarbon Laboratory offers a concise guide
The oldest securely dated complete silk pile carpet from the Muslim world, now in the Museum of Islamic Art in Doha, is particularly significant in the history of oriental carpets. Its synthesis of patterns casts light on the extensive trade and cultural links across Asia and the Mediterranean region between 1350 and 1450 that enabled… Read more »
To date, the National Council for Culture, Arts & Heritage of the Emirate of Qatar has acquired five historical Spanish carpets and eight from Egypt and Syria for the new Museum of Islamic Art in Doha. It is these that are the focus of the second in our series of in-depth surveys of the MIAQ collection by Michael Franses. An abridged version of this article, without references or citations, appears in HALI 157, Autumn 2008.
Qatar’s Museum of Islamic Art in Doha, capital of the oil-and gas-rich Gulf State, opened its doors to the public on 22 November 2008. In this, the first of an occasional series of articles on highlights of the collection, we concentrate on the group of Safavid Persian carpets acquired by the MIAQ over the course of the past decade from private collections and at public auction. This article by Michael Franses is an extended version, with citations and references as well as additional images, of the abridgement published in HALI 155, Spring 2008, pp.72-89.
The unabridged review by Andy Hale of David and Sue Richardson’s The Qaraqalpaqs of the Aral Delta, published by Prestel. The abridged version appeared in HALI 175
