Antique Persian Malayer Pictorial Rug

A wool pile of symmetric knots on a cotton foundation. Four places are inscribed. The nearly black field depicts, at the bottom, a swineherd with his passel of pigs; at the center, Sheikh San’an and the Christian maiden; and above, a building with a mounted rider and a footman. Additional figures stand or lounge throughout the scene. A pointed arch crowns the composition, with fat cows filling the spandrels. The narrow ecru border shows slanted leaves and geometric rosettes, and an additional ecru border below features a row of potted plants. This is a rug that rewards careful study to tease out its many pictorial and iconographical details.