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The Emperor's Carpet

second half 16th century
On view at The Met Fifth Avenue in Gallery 462
One of the finest products of the Safavid court ateliers, this carpet once adorned the summer residence of the Habsburg emperors. The main field balances a sophisticated net of floral scrolls, large composite palmettes, cloud bands, buds, and blossoms with a myriad of real and fictional animals—dragons and Chinese antelope, lion and buffalo, tigers and leopards, ducks and pheasants. A verse found in the inner guard band likens a garden in springtime to the Garden of Paradise.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: The Emperor's Carpet
  • Date: second half 16th century
  • Geography: Attributed to Iran
  • Medium: Silk (warp and weft), wool (pile); asymmetrically knotted pile
  • Dimensions: Rug:
    L. 299 in. (759.5 cm)
    W. 133 1/2 in. (339.1 cm)
    Wt. on a 10" tube: 144 lbs. (65.3 kg)
  • Classification: Textiles-Rugs
  • Credit Line: Rogers Fund, 1943
  • Object Number: 43.121.1
  • Curatorial Department: Islamic Art

Audio

Cover Image for 6777. The Emperor's Carpet

6777. The Emperor's Carpet

Reading: Hear a reading of the inscriptions on this carpet

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SHEILA CANBY: There’s an inscription running all around the perimeter of this carpet. It’s from the 13th century poet Zahirudin Faryabi. The Persian reciter Iraj Anvar reads just the first part of it in English, and then the entire poem in Persian.

IRAJ ANVAR: (translated from Persian) Come, for the breeze of spring has renewed the promise of the meadow / for the freshness of the beloved’s cheek has returned to the meadow. / No sooner had the meadow washed the milk of the cloud from its lips / than those green whiskers sprouted around its countenance as on the lip of an adolescent. / The cloistered ladies of the meadow display themselves today. / You would think it was a wedding for their daughter-sprouts.

    Listen to more about this artwork

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