Catalog Number
|
Catalog Number |
CAS 0389-2405 | |
| Category | Textiles | |
| Object Name | Coptic textile fragment | |
| Culture | Coptic Egyptian | |
| Global Region | North Africa | |
| Country | Egypt | |
| State/Prov./Dist. | ||
| County | ||
| Other Geographic Data | unknown | |
| Maker's Name | Unknown | |
| Date of Manufacture | ca. 900-1000 CE | |
| Collection Name | Rietz Collection of Textiles | |
| Materials | Wool | |
| Description | “Upper portion of a tunic front. The polychrome design on a dark pink ground is organized as a rectangular panel framed on three sides by plain and figured dark blue bands. Some of the figures appear to represent butterflies: the other are nude dancer. At the upper end of the panel is a rectangle containing stylized figures that could represent satyrs and maenads. Standing in the center is an imposing, robed figure. The technique is tapestry, 7 x 30 [warp : weft per square cm], woven entirely in wool and so carefully worked that the front and the back are nearly identical. All yarn is S-twist. Tenth century. Remarks: The figure in the center may be Dionysus or Orpheus. Some late antique religious cults worshipped Dionysus or Orpheus in connection with Neopythagoreanism, interpreting them as representations of sacrifice and rebirth. The figures in the border, butterflies and putti, are emblems of Eros and Psyche, mythical figures whose story was given meaning on a metaphysical level by certain pagan-influenced thinkers of the early Christian era. The form of the dot-cluster filler motifs is typical of textiles known to have been woven during the Fatimid period which helps date this piece. The dark pink ground is also a late feature. [Regarding textiles in this group, DL Carroll # 41-72 (CAS 0389-2382, -2384, -2389, -2390, -2391, -2392, -2393, -2396, -2399, -2401, -2405, -2409, -2410, -2411, -2414, -2415, -2416, -2417, -2419, -2420, -2422, -2423, -2424, -2427, -2434, -2435, -2436, -2453, -2454, -2457, -2579, -2580, -2581, -2582, -2599):] After the Arab conquest in the mid-seventh century, Coptic textile design changed its character, moving ever more distant from its classical Roman and Greek sources. In part, this was a reaction against Byzantine culture, associated in the Coptic mind with oppression. Contributing to the change may have been Islamic prohibitions against depicting human and animal figures. Such figures when they appear in Coptic textiles of the later periods become increasingly abstract to the point of being virtually unrecognizable.†[From Looms and Textiles of the Copts by Diane Lee Carroll (San Francisco, CA: Memoirs of the California Academy of Sciences, No. 11, 1988); Catalog # 55, pp. 136, 160-163.] | |
| Dimensions (cm) | Width = 38.0, Length = 27.0 | |