Course Description

Instructor: Bill Fletcher

Oriental rugs are universally admired and collected.  Classic examples can be found in many major museums.  But where did they come from and how did the patterns evolve?

Examples from before 1500 CE exist in two forms.  First, carpet fragments found in many places and some few, mostly whole carpets.  Second, carpets appearing in various works of art, including painted miniatures, frescoes in Central Asian caves, and on silver from the 
pre-Islamic Sasanian era (roughly 250-650 CE).

Over four weeks, using these resources, this course will trace the history of designs up to the beginning of the 16th century, when the first actual extant carpets began to appear.