Rugs

Rugs: Oriental and Occidental, Antique & Modern, is a handbook for ready reference by Rosa Belle Holt. The book is a new and enlarged edition, entirely reset, with 33 full-page illustrations, 12 in full color, and other drawings in the text, and a map of the Orient. A caption describes an antique Tabriz silk rug of finely blended colors and rare design, saying it represents the individual squares on the floor of a mosque, each of which may be occupied by a worshipper kneeling in prayer.

The text says that on the marbles of Nineveh is represented the pectoral worn by Sardanapalus, an exact miniature of a Kurdish rug of modern times. The text says that when Cleopatra, the famous Queen of Egypt, went to meet Cæsar for the first time, she cleverly had herself carried into his palace wrapped in a rug of the finest texture. The text says Soumak rugs ought really to be called Shemakha, for that is the name of the town in the government of Baku from which they are exported.