This Lavar Kerman is extremely faithful to the classical Persian weaving tradition, going back as it does to the hunting and animal carpets of the Safavid era (16th to 17th centuries). The red ground displays a finely proportioned flowering tree, as in a garden, supporting exotic white monkeys, birds, and lions in a fantastic assemblage redolent of paradise. A pointed medallion in the midst of the field contains a white elephant surrounded by foliage. The main, blue-ground border has a vine inhabited alternately by lions and white cattle, providing a smaller scale counterpart to the field design. The cornerpieces, reminiscent of the finest and earliest Persian embroidered shawls, consist of finely-executed botehs on a blue ground. Rarely do nineteenth-century Persian rugs replicate the opulent exoticism of Safavid rugs with such grace and confidence. From this perspective, the present example is surely a masterpiece.
