CHANTEH: The beginning

Friday, September 10, 2010

The beginning

After I bought my first chanteh, over a decade ago, I developed a passion for small South Persian bags. I've tried, since I started to collect them, to steer a course between 'quality' and comprehensiveness, so the pieces you will see here are sometimes beautiful, occasionally rare, and more often representative of a particular style or motif. Most of them, I believe, embody something special, interesting, or unusual, and almost all are intimate and personal.

There is very little written on chanteh, and as far as I'm aware there is only one book devoted to them. This is 'Jayran - Tribal Woman and the Chanteh in Iran' by Parviz Homayounpour, which is now one of the most consulted books in my small rug library. I have learned much by studying its photographs, and I wholeheartedly recommend it.

This blog documents a collection of small South Persian tribal bags, most of which might be called 'chantehs'. Not all would conventionally be considered 'high quality', but they are generally interesting, and I've tried to include examples of very different styles and techniques. Most were made in the first half of the 20th century; some are earlier, and a handful are recent. Colours are assumed to be natural unless indicated to the contrary, and with a few exceptions, all materials are wool. The photographs were taken in natural light.

Viewers not familiar with the tribes or their confederations - Qashqa'i, Khamseh, Luri (or Lori), Bakhtiari, and Afshar - will find plenty of information on them in Wikipedia. And if you are really interested in collectors' debates and opinions, visit Turkotek, which is a good forum for both informed and speculative views on old textiles.

Click on the images to enlarge them. There are over seventy small bags illustrated here, so if you wish to see everything, remember to view the older pages. The collection has now more or less come to an end, but it is possible that a few pieces will be added from time to time. Curiously, as I've developed more experience in looking at and handling these weavings, my conclusions have become increasingly tentative - so readers should not regard my thoughts as being in any way definitive!

As I said when I started the blog ten years ago, the only book on the subject is 'Jayran - Tribal Woman and the Chanteh' by the late Parviz Homayounpour. It has been a great inspiration, and I heartily recommend it. Otherwise it is difficult to find a substantial group of images of these bags. In that light, I hope that the blog will be useful to collectors and to others who are interested in tribal weavings.

Friday, September 10, 2010

The beginning

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