The Elk County advocate. [volume] (Ridgway, Pa.) 1868-1883, 1878-12-05
CARPETS.
Where They Como From, who Use Them.
and How Made.


Carpets come from the East, says an
American paper, and their manufacture
dates far back into antiquity. The
Babylonians made them; they form
ed noted branch of manufacture in
Turkey and Persia before they were
known in England. They belong to
that Oriental luxuriousness of taste
which was the exact opposite of the
Saxon. The Mohammedan who prostrates
himself many times day upon the
ground found it convenient to have
something on which to kneel and which
he could easily carry with him, while a
like habit of sitting cross-legged upon
the floor made the same material first
comfort, then an ornament to his house.
To these uses we may probably trace
the custom in all Oriental countries,
copied largely by France, of having car
pets in one piece and then to only par
TALLY cover the floor, or of the use of
rugs merely before the principal pieces
of furniture. 1t is only in America,
England and Germany at the present
day that carpets are universally used
covering the entire floor, and where the
plan of waxing floors, as in France, is
almost entirely unknown. Those who
have painfully walked through some of
the palaces of Europe, shuffling along in
felt slippers, or endeavoring to stand
upright without them, realize the COM
forts of we'll covered floor, as we'll as
the great addition to the beauty of we'll
furnished house.
1t is somewhat singular that the Eng
lish should have been 30 late as they
were in discovering tho utility of car
pets, for while they did not need them
for the act of worship, the climate would
naturally suggest such an addition to
warmth. Yet we learn from history
that as late as the reigns of Queens
Mary and Elizabeth rushes were used,
even in the palaces, though carpets had
been imported to some extent from the
East. Shakespeare occasionally refers
to them, and Bacon, who was contempo-
rary with him, describes a reception
thus: "Against the wall, in the middle
of the half-pace, is chair placed before
him with table and carpet before
it ;" from which it will be seen that the
first carpets in use then we're the same
as we find in the East now, mere squares
or rugs. At that day they were consid-
cred as luxuries, and for common daily
use the English adhered as tenaciously
to their straw and rushes as they do now
TO their roast beef and ale.
Not much is known of the earliest
Eastern fabrics, but as these nations
change but slowly it is safe to assume
that the first carpets were thin tapes
tries, made by hand, as they are made
at the present day. The process of fast
ening tufts of woolen into a warp with
hn nr1x 81 ~
tedious, but this is of small account in
countries where labor is of SO little
value. The same process in France at
the present day makes the Gobelins
tapestries of immense value, so that they
rarely, if ever, come into the market,
but are reserved for royalty. Many
years are sometimes occupied in pro.
ducing some of the more ornate pieces.
Portraits and pictures of birds, animals
and flowers are accurately and beauti-
fully reproduced, and what is more won-
derful is, that the artist does his work
with the back of the tapestry toward
him. He can only see what he has ac-
complished by going round to inspect
it when he stops for dinner or leaves at
night.
From this tapestry has sprung un-
doubtedly all our modern carpets.
When the manufacture was taken up in
England, devices were employed to null
tiply the fabrics and to cheaper them.
This led to hand loom and subsequently
to machinery and the use OF power.
Good limitations of Turkish carpets were
made at Administer, and were called
after the name of the town. Few people
have any idea of the process OF manu-
facture. 1t is one of the few remaining
branches of Turkish industry.
The methods of work in the ancient
towns of Oushak, Honla and Ghoirdofs
are of the simplest and rudest descrip-
tion. A vertical frame supports two
horizontal rollers about five feet apart.
The warp, of any required length, con-
sisting OF an upper and lower thread, is
wound around the upper roller and the
ends fastened to the lower one by the
girls, who sit cross-legged in a row be-
fore the frame. Each workwoman has a
certain width allotted to her, and pro-
ceeds to knot the tufts which form the
pile in rows, using different colors to
form the pattern. The tying of the tufts
and the picking out of the various color
ed woods, which hang in balls over the
frame, is carried on with surprising
rapidity, the pattern being worked
solely from memory. Yet with the aid of
the rude frame, pair of shears and
comb, the workers contrive to produce
the most harmoniously colored and GER
tainly the most durable carpets in the
trade. European taste has done much
to foster this manufacture, but has
never been able to improve it. A live
lier class of goods is produced to meet
the American demand than those used
by Transatlantic purchasers.
1t would be interesting to follow the
growth of this manufacture, and to de-
scribe the machinery by which it is pro-
duced, but that is impossible here. 1t
is only fair to say, however, that no
country has made more rapid strides
than this branch of manufacture.
More has been accomplished in one
hundred years than in all the centuries
preceding. Public taste, united to a
desire to economize, has led to an i'm
mense production of ingrains, three
phys and Brussels, and this demand has
stimulated the inventive genius of the
weavers and artists, until, in colors,
designs and quality of frbric, there is
nothing left to desire. 1t is a perfect
mystery how goods uniting such qualities
of beauty and of substantial wear can be
produced at such prices. The ingrains
can be had as low as the homemade
"rag" carpet, and the Brussels as low
as the ingrains were formerly, while in
the latter there is hardly an end to the
patterns that NAV he nroducad