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The Chinese
carpet can be said to have originated in
the north-west of China in the area
around Xinjiang. Some findings show that
tufted carpets with coloured designs
were being produced in China twenty-five
centuries ago. In 1978, an archaeologist
working from Xinjiang discovered a
fragment of woollen fabric thought to be
three thousand years old and which is
likely to be the forerunner of the
tufted carpet.
Research indicates that following the
Western Han Dynasty (206 BC - 24 AD) the
technique of carpet making spread along
the silk route extending from Qinghai,
Gansu, Nigxia, Shenmu and Yulin to Inner
Mongolia and Shanxi. Carpet weaving
later extended into other locations such
as Beijing (formerly Peking), Tianjing,
Hebei and Shandong, where their own
distinctive styles evolved.
The traditional Chinese knotted carpets
were made from wool but northern nomads
would also use goat and camel hair.
Early weavers found that silk had
special qualities that gave nuances of
colour as the light source changed or
was varied. Pure silk is soft and cool
to touch.
The designs developed by the weavers
followed those in other established art
forms and therefore Buddhist and Taoist
symbols such as the swastika, the yin
and yang motif as well as other
religious imagery were used. Popular
designs included lotus flowers, clouds
as well as a variety of real and
mythical animals such as dragons, the
phoenix, elephants, horses and bats. The
bat (fu) sharing its name with the
Chinese word for luck was a particular
symbol of good fortune.
These designs were largely symbolic
rather than purely decorative and the
colours used were those which were
considered to be both elegant and of
good taste. These included black, blue,
red, white, beige and yellow.
The art of carpet weaving reached a peak
during the period from the 16th to the
18th century. Skilled weavers created
complex geometric designs that were
simple yet with perfectly balanced
symmetry while also having strong local
characteristics. With the passage of
time the techniques of the carpet weaver
spread from China through western Asia
and into countries as far away as Persia
and beyond.
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