embroidered, 1800s, Persian; WhiteworkPlain weave cotton embroidered with silk in straight stitches, needleweaving and pulled thread work; whitework
Described with Museum Number in the lower left hand corner. There are two raw edges.
There is a delicate outer border of long-stemmed diamonds; this is incomplete along the right hand side. There is a band of needleweaving either side of a broader band of embroidered diamons [each made of 8 triangles] on a pulled thread ground. In each corner is a square containing an embroidered lozenge and 4 small squares. There is a pointed triangular corner unit worked into an open mesh of needlewoven bars, some holes have a stitched infill. Although it is irregular, there was an attempt to alternate a hole with an infill. Mid-way along each side is a squat, thick-trunked tree-like motif in pulled thread with overcast bars. In the centre is an octagon of needlewoven bars in the same pattern as the corner units. It contains a small octagon bordered with reciprocal trefoils, a pulled thread ground and an odd embroidered design of leaves, star-like flowers and a lily [?]. the field between the corner units and the central octagon is embroidered with small 8-pointed stars edged with an inward-facing fine band of long-stemmed diamonds. The large octagon and the inside edge of the corner units have a narrow border in which embroidered reciprocal triangles alternate with sections of needleweaving.
Cotton thread: Z-spun
Embroidery Thread: white silk; 2S