Cleveland Museum of Art

Turkmen Bag Face

Date

1800s

Medium

Wool, silk, cotton; 252 symmetrical rug knots per square inch

Culture

Turkmenistan, Saryk tribe of the Turkmen people (1850-1899), 19th century

Department

Textiles

Institution

Cleveland Museum of Art

The front of this bag, called a bag face, displays the distinctive hallmarks of the Saryk tribe. The main guls, or lobed motifs, are subdivided in quadrants and alternate with angular minor guls in staggered rows. It is the oldest known weaving of the Saryk tribe, with a soft red ground color and white cotton and magenta silk pile highlights. Essential storage containers, bags were suspended from wall trellises inside tents and transported by pack animals during seasonal migrations. Bags were woven in one piece with pile on the upper part for the front face and plain weave on the lower part for the back face, and then folded and sewn along both sides.

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