Page 171 - Art In The Age Of Exploration (Great Section on Chinese Art Ming Dynasty)

Spanish carpets, like all European hand-knotted
carpets, are based on Persian techniques. How-
ever, Spanish designs reflect the unique con-
tribution of the Moors, who absorbed design
elements — Persian, Roman, Coptic—along every
step of their nomadic journey to northern Africa
and then to Spain, where Moorish elements often
intermingled with Christian ones.
One of the most distinctive types of early Span-
ish rugs is the heraldic carpet, a long, narrow rug
with coats of arms woven into the design. This
example, which bears the arms of Don Fadrique
Enriquez de Mendoza (c. 1390-1473), Lord of
Medina de Rioseco and twenty-sixth Admiral of
Castile, is one of half a dozen that were donated
by the Enriquez family to the Convent of Santa
Clara in Palencia. They are all called "admiral"
carpets because they bear the coat of arms of
Fadrique Enriquez, the second member of the
Enriquez family to bear the hereditary title of
Admiral of Castile. The device includes a lion
rampant, two triple towered castles, and anchors.
Fadrique Enriquez de Mendoza and his first
wife, Marina de Ayala, were the parents of Juana
Enriquez, queen of Aragon and mother of King
Ferdinand. The convent of Santa Clara was begun
by Don Fadrique's father, Alfonso Enriquez, and
continued by the son. It was to be the burial place
of the Admirals of Castile. In 1910 the carpets
donated to the convent were sold and dispersed.
Besides this example in the Philadelphia Museum,
one is in the Villa Vizcaya Museum (Miami), two
in The Art Institute of Chicago, one in the Textile
Museum (Washington), and one in the Institute
de Valencia de Don Juan (Madrid).
The carpet appears to have been woven by
Muslim craftsmen, as is evidenced by the upper
and lower borders of illegible Kufesque script
(Ellis 1988, 247). Rugs belonging to another set of
admiral carpets, donated to the Convent of Santa
Isabel de los Reyes in Toledo, bear the legible
Kufic inscription, "There is no God but Allah" —
an inclusion that, if they understood it, evidently
did not offend the Christian patrons.
Of all the surviving admiral carpets, this is per-
haps the finest. An elaborate design in tones of
ivory to brown is laid upon a dark blue back-
ground. The diapering surrounding the coats of
arms contains, within myriad octagons, a lively
array of peacocks, ducks, hawks, tiny heraldic
lions, and stylized human figures with upraised
arms. The borders along the length of the carpet
frame a rich variety of scenes that have a narrative
element—rampant bears under a tree wait for
fruit to fall, a hound torments a stag, and bears
are attacked by armed wild men, while ladies in
impossible farthingales await the outcome. s.s.

170 CIRCA 1492