Tribal Antique Turkish Milas Rugs
Click to learn moreShowing the single result
-
Small Size Tribal Pattern Antique Rustic Turkish Milas Scatter 19th Century Rug 45480
Size: 4 ft 2 in x 5 ft 9 in (1.27 m x 1.75 m)
Showing the single result
Your Cart
Learn More About Antique Turkish Tribal Milas Rugs
Milas Rugs (also spelled Melas) – Turkish rugs produced in the district of Milas are unique in their style and composition. The area around Mugla Province was a holdout for Turkmen enclaves. These people followed a semi-nomadic lifestyle, used natural dye-stuffs and incorporated a stunning variety of angular botanical motifs and symbols into the carpets they wove. Antique Milas rugs feature a unique composition that includes broad, prominent borders that result in a comparatively narrow field. Multiple borders rendered in contrasting colors are often featured in these classical Turkish rugs. The color palette tends toward warm, earthy hues that are produced with vegetable dyes.
Early Milas rugs created in the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries featured an angular, geometric style that was full of ancient symbols and abstract botanical motifs. By the late 19th century, a second style evolved. This change was spurred largely by outside influences. Imperial powers in Hereke affected the Turkish style profoundly as did European demand for fine exports. Later baroque rugs incorporated curvilinear arabesques and delicate floral motifs that were more recognizable to the western eye. The colors also became more saturated and varied compared to the soft, warm hues featured in earlier Milas rugs. The classic antique Milas prayer rugs with their long, narrow fields and angular mirhabs are the most iconic Turkish carpets from the area. These formal carpets are traditional, rustic and beautifully styled. The classical Turkmen appearance of antique Milas rugs works equally well in contemporary and old-world interiors.
Antique Milas rugs from southwestern Turkey are exceedingly beautiful in the finesse of their weave and drawing, and in the subtlety of their coloration. Famed particularly for their classic red- ground prayer rugs with simple niches or mihrabs, Milas weavers also produced long area rugs with geometric patterns. The Milas repertoire is mostly floral, although it is often so abstracted that this aspect is no longer immediately apparent. Read More about Milas and Karaova Turkish Village Rugs.
Guide to Turkish Village Rugs
Milas / Melas rugs are among the most collectible Turkish village rugs and weaving. Long a staple of antique Turkish rugs, Milas / Melas pieces are prized for their rich yet delicate palette and for the finesse and sureness of their drawing.
The most well-known type of Milas / Melas is the prayer rug format, characterized by a relatively simple red niche with a diamond mihrab or arch at the top, often with a wide main border of floral or geometric rug type. Less familiar is another type of small or scatter sized Melas that has been attributed more specifically to the village rugs of Karaova to the south of Melas itself.
These are not generally prayer rugs, but like the more familiar Melas type, they tend to have a small field with the rest of the surface occupied by one large or several smaller borders. The above piece, is an outstanding and unusual example of these Karaova-Melas antique rugs, while another from the Nazmiyal Collection, below, is more representative of the type.
Karaova-Melas rugs are distinguished most of all by a sinuous, dynamic form of vine scroll with pointed indentations, used primarily as a border, but also as field filler. On this antique Milas village rug it is used twice, in two different borders with varied coloration.
This type of border has a distinguished lineage traceable to the finest classical Turkish carpets of the sixteenth and 17th Centuries, like the well-known Medallion- and Star-Oushak rugs.
The rug below here, comes particularly close to such classical forerunners, but the recognizably of the vine-scroll is obscured somewhat by the use of different ground colors on either side of the vine. The feathery palmettes adjacent to the vine are related to the vine-scroll borders on rugs from the nearby Makri area.
Interestingly, Karaova is about halfway between Milas / Melas and Makri. Thus it is not surprising that Karaova rugs should relate to the weaving traditions of the areas immediately to the North and South.
The inner border on this rug is also a distinctive feature of antique Karaova pieces. It too comes from classical Turkish forerunners, although not those of Ushak, but rather from the so-called Holbein group.
The main element in this border is a form that seems to be one half of a cruciform hooked motif with serrated leafy arms, a type attested in early Turkish Ghirlandaio carpets as a border design. On rugs of the so-called Large-Pattern Holbein group it already appears cut in half and repeated in a staggered arrangement.
Because of the small field size typical on Milas / Melas and Karaova carpets, we only see limited portion of this design three quatrefoils in soft green and red, and portions of the stars as the blue ground. This is one of the oldest designs in the Oriental rug repertory.
It is already attested in the representations of rugs in Timurid manuscript painting of the fifteenth century. Among early Turkish carpets it was a fairly standard field pattern in the large Pattern Holbein group, although there the eight-pointer stars are the main motif with portions of quatrefoils making up the ground. Quatrefoils were also an important component in the field designs of another offshoot of the Holbein group, the so-called Lotto carpets, especially the Kilim Pattern Lotto pieces.
The quatrefoils on the latter have internal elements like those on Nazmiyal 41963. It is also possible that the feathery leaves in the Karaova and Makri vine scroll borders also come from Kilim Pattern Lotto forerunners, where such feathery leaves constitute and important detail of the quatrefoils.
Therefore, this rug emerges as an important piece, not only for the unusual aspects of its design within the Milas / Melas Karaova production, but also because of the range of classical Turkish forerunners that it seems to draw upon, and the possible relevance of this to the origins of the various Southwestern Turkish rug types.
Milas / Melas, Karaova, and Makri are all on the extreme Southwest coast of Turkey. Yet various aspects of the design repertory of the rugs woven there – the pointed vine scroll, the feathery leaves of the vinescroll, the border made up of dissected hooked cruciform motifs, the reciprocal field pattern of quatrefoils and eight-pointed stars, and even their filler motifs – all come from Ushak and Ghirlandaio carpets, or from rugs belonging to the Holbein group, which have sometimes been attributed to Ushak.
All these types were made in the more northerly areas of Western Anatolia. So it would seem that at some point in the seventeenth or eighteenth centuries, this Northwest Anatolian production began to influence rug weaving in the region to the Southwest, which eventually developed into the familiar nineteenth-century types of this region.
More than any other Southwestern type, Karaova Melas rugs still bear the evident impact of this influence. As such the provide an opportunity to recognize the close connections among the various Southwest types and to understand more clearly how nineteenth century Turkish village weaving may have grown from the traditions established earlier in Turkish rugs of the classical era.
a month ago
Twenty or so years ago my father gave me a beautiful antique Persian rug - after so many years (and kids and pets) it needed some TLC, so I brought it to Nazmiyal. I just picked it up today and - wow! They got the stains out entirely and the entire rug is brighter; they also made some repairs - it's back in my living room and looks fantastic, and the bill was lower than I'd expected. Overall it was a great experience - the people are wonderful, the work was perfect, and I saw so many beautiful rugs at their store that I found myself wishing for a larger apartment. Next time I need any work done on a rug, or find an open bit of floor I know where I'll be heading.
4 years ago
It is always a delight going to the Nazmiyal showroom. This Qashqai is one of several purchases made over the years, and mom is truly enjoying it. Jason and the staff are very knowledgeable and friendly. They listen to the customeru2019s needs. When I go to the showroom, it is like visiting my family because we have the same appreciation for the textile arts.nnOriental carpets are a rare discipline to be educated in, because you canu2019t go to a university to have certain types of training and experience, such as knowing the cultures and processes of carpet weaving. Jason has such a refined eye that he can distinguish a good rug from a great rug, and that knowledge is offered to the customer to elevate their point of view.nnComing here has been an initiation into a world of culture, art, and beauty which has sustained me, and for that I am grateful.
4 years ago
Loved my runner rug purchase from Nazmiyal. Love the ability to purchase, try and return if it didn't work out! I had it shipped to California and everything worked out beautifully!
a year ago
NAZMIYAL is the best source for antique and vintage rugs and carpets. Staff is extremely knowledgeable, Jason himself is an amazing dealer who handpicks each and every piece in his stunning collection and is happy to educate the consumer, not just make a sale. I always trust his experience and great eye for all my spaces!
4 years ago
I had an absolutely wonderful experience working with Nazmiyal. I was very impressed by their selection, the quality of their beautiful carpets, and their extremely reasonable prices. Really I cannot say enough about how helpful everyone at the gallery was - especially Omri, work with him if you can! - and how happy I am with my new antique rug. Five stars, highly, highly recommended!