Motif from Kashmir Shawl: Color Mooshkee (Elephant Color), No. 14, Persia, By Order of Shooja ool Moolkh

One of group of eight textile designs made in Kashmir and sent to England in 1823 by British trader, William Moorcroft for use in the shawl making industry. These textile designs are the only surviving from a group of 34 drawings he sent, as part of his personal interest in making British shawls supreme over all competitors. They are all painted on paper in brilliant colored gouache and varnished. Each shows a large stylized Paisley "cone" set in a field and are signed on the verso "William Moorcroft, Kashmeer, 1823", numbered, inscribed with the color of the ground in Kashmiri vernacular, and, on all but two, with the name and country of the person who commissioned the original shawl. In England, they would have been translated to graph paper to create mise-en-cartes for the guidance of a weaver.



This design, titled "Moosh[kee] [elephant color]", contains a large paisley "cone" decorated with scrolling branches with stylized flowers and leaves. The branches that fill the lower part of the cone contain only leaves, colored with green and decorated with intermittent cream lines, and the branches are colored with red, many of them forming c- and s-curves. There is a red rosette with several layers of petals in the center, which seems to be holding the entire bundle that makes up the cone. The garlands in the rest of the cone contain some similar leaves, but they are mostly made of colorful leaves and stylized flowers, all rendered with shades of red, black, yellow and white. The shape of the cone is outlined with a black line, and the outside is filled with the same type of floral motifs that made the upper part of the inside of the cone.