The art of weaving flourishes in parts of the world where there is access to fibers, from plants like cotton or flax, or animals like sheep and silkworms. In rug-weaving societies, the fiber most frequently used is wool from sheep, and to a lesser extent, goats. These animals are adaptable to a variety of human lifestyles, nomadic or settled. Wool is durable, warm, easily dyed, and in a pile rug, the cut fibers reflect light and give the surface a soft sheen.

• Wool
  • Shearing and washing the fleece
  • Carding and spinning the wool
  • Dyeing the wool
• Cashmere and silk
• Cotton

Wool

Shearing and washing the fleece: The fleece, or coat of wool, must be removed from the sheep by cutting or shearing. The fleece is greasy and tangled, grayish-brown with dirt, and full of twigs, leaves, and insects. The raw fleeces are immersed in a spring or running stream, lathered with soap, and beaten against rocks until they are white and free of impurities.

Carding and spinning the wool: The wool may be clean, but it is still a tangle of mats and snarls. The fibers need to be detached from each other and made to lie roughly parallel. They are combed or carded into a loose mass to aid the spinners, who convert these fluffs of wool, handful by handful, into yarn. Each spinner holds a spindle, a wooden implement shaped like a toy top, in one hand. With the other hand, she attaches a mass of carded wool to a leader of yarn on the spindle. Then she gives the spindle a spin, rotating the fibers. With her fingers, she gently pulls the fibers to carry the twist through the wool, shaping it into a long thread. As the yarn is spun, it is wound around the spindle, and another handful of fibers is attached to its end. The process is repeated until all the wool has been spun. Sometimes the yarns are plied, or twisted together, to create thicker yarns. Yarns meant to be used for pile rugs generally are spun loosely. This allows the dye to penetrate each fiber, and also allows the cut pile ends to unravel slightly and expand to fill in the surface of the rug.

Dyeing the wool: After it is spun, yarn is wound into manageable units called hanks or skeins. Then it is ready for the dyers. Before the twentieth century most dyes were obtained from plants: blues from indigo, yellows from saffron, turmeric, or weld, reds from madder, and black from oak gall. Another red, more purplish in hue, can be extracted from cochineal, a tiny insect. Variations in these basic colors can be achieved by dyeing one color over another, blue over yellow for green, for example. (Grays and browns could be obtained from sheep with gray or brown fleece.) The yarns to be dyed are submerged in pots of simmering water, then the plant matter and a mordant (a chemical added to the dyebath to increase dye absorption and fastness) are added in proportion to the weight of the wool. Despite the use of measured amounts, skeins of wool dyed at different times in different locations may not be exactly the same color. In the finished rug, this effect of subtle shade variation is called abrash.

Cashmere and silk

Cashmere, or pashmina, is the undercoat hair of Himalayan mountain goats. Indian weavers were familiar with pashmina, which was used for weaving fine shawls. Pashmina is processed in the same manner as sheep’s wool. It takes dyes very well, can be spun into fine yarn, and it is very soft and lustrous. Pashmina was the pile fiber of choice for the finest Mughal carpets.

Silk, spun from the unraveled cocoons of silkworms, was expensive, as it had to be imported from China or northern Iran. When used as pile, it creates a surface sheen unmatched in other fibers. However, it is not as durable as wool or pashmina. In the Mughal carpets, silk was often used for warp and weft threads, because it could be spun finer than cotton, thus allowing for more knots per inch and more complex patterns in the finished rug.

Cotton

Cotton, native to India, grows in fluffy “bolls” on the tops of plants. Yarns made of cotton are not as easily dyed as the animal fibers are, and when used for pile, they are not as durable or lustrous. However, cotton is strong and stable. It often was used for the warp and weft foundation, where it would not be seen, but where it would provide stability to the knotted pile and allow the rug to lie flat.

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