Pazyryk knotted-pile carpet
Alfombra anudada de Pazyryk
- Date
- c. 400 BCE · confidence medium
- Place
- Pazyryk Valley, Altai Republic, Russia
- Credited to
- Scythian Pazyryk people (workshop origin disputed)
- Field
- Tools
⚠️ Disputed: the sources disagree.
What it is
A wool carpet in symmetrical knot, about 200 x 183 cm with 36 knots per cm², preserved by ice in an Altai burial mound. It is the oldest surviving knotted-pile carpet and already shows a highly developed design.
Excavated by Rudenko in 1949 (kurgan 5). Whether it was woven in Achaemenid Persia, Armenia or by the Scythians themselves is debated; its size and refinement suggest an earlier tradition that left no remains. Held in the Hermitage.
What it led to
- origin of the Central Asian and Persian knotted-carpet tradition
- reference for the chronology of the symmetrical (Ghiordes) knot
- the carpet as a luxury good and trade item