This cloth is a form of tiraz, an inscribed fabric that conventionally features Arabic-language inscriptions with the place and date of their manufacture. In Egypt, some Christians inscribed cloth with petitionary prayers or quotations from the Psalms in Greek or Coptic. While the inscription on this textile is largely illegible, the words "use it in happiness and rejoice" can be deciphered. Such well-wishes recall colophons in ninth-century manuscripts in the Saint Michael Collection, indicating commonalities between inscribed Christian objects across media.
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Artwork Details
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Title:Three Fragments with a Coptic Inscription
Date:810–1010 (radiocarbon date, 95% probability)
Geography:Attributed to Egypt, Akhmim (former Panopolis)
Medium:Tapestry weave in polychrome and undyed wool on plain-weave ground of undyed wool; a row of stitches in undyed wool below the top edge
Dimensions:Textile Fragment A: H. 24 13/16 in. (31.4 cm) W. 12 3/8 in. (63 x 31.4 cm) Textile Fragment B: H. 6 3/4 in. (17.1 cm) W. 11 in. (27.9 cm) Textile Fragment C: H. 12 7/16 in. (31.6 cm) W. 20 3/4 in. (52.7 cm)
Classification:Textiles
Credit Line:Gift of George F. Baker, 1890
Object Number:90.5.877
Three fragments with Coptic Inscriptions
These three fragments belong to the upper or lower end of a large rectangular cloth. The frayed edges of fragments b and c fit together, and, given the condition of the three fragments (staining, fold line, degradation, and the word order of the inscription), it appears that fragment a was originally directed to the left of fragment b.
Each piece is decorated with an inscription, preceded (a) or terminated (c) by an ornamental band with a row of yellow and blue lozenges on a red background. The band narrows and widens to connect a circle and a little bird. The inscription begins and ends with small crosses and a rosette. It is a mock inscription, and only a few words are legible. However, the words "use it in happiness" and "and rejoice" indicate a prayer of joy or a quotation from the Bible. The words "happiness and rejoice" appear in exactly the same sequence on a fragment with similar tapestry bands in the Suermondt-Ludwig-Museum in Aachen, Germany, which most probably belongs to the same cloth.[11] It is an expression used also in ninth-century book colophons from the Fayyum.[12]
Other woolen textiles with a dense weaving structure like the one seen here, similar motifs, and a one-line inscription constitute a special group to which these fragments can be added.[13] They seem to have been made in one and the same workshop. Without reliable information about the findspot of such fabrics, however, it is not possible to localize their place of production.
Cäcilia Fluck in [Evans and Ratliff 2012]
Footnotes:
11. Inv. no. T331/SB 0331; mentioned by Annette Paetz gen. Schieck. "Textile Bilderwelten. Wechselwirkungen zwischen Ägypten und Rom: Untersuchungen an 'koptischen' Textilien unter besonderer Berücksichtigung unbearbeiteter Sammlungsbestände in Nordrhein-Westfalen." Ph.D diss. Universität zu Köln, 2002, p. 102, n. 878. I am grateful to Annette Schieck, who showed me photos of the fragments.
12.Jacques van der Vliet. "’In a Robe of Gold’: Status, Magic, and Politics on Inscribed Christian Textiles from Egypt." In Textile Messages: Inscribed Fabrics from Roman to Abbasid Egypt, edited by Cäcilia Fluck and Gisela Helmecke, pp. 38–39. Leiden, 2006; for further textiles see Harald Froschauer. "Koptische Textilien mit Inschriften in der Papyrussammlung der Österreichischen Nationalbibliothek". In Textile Messages: Inscribed Fabrics from Roman to Abbasid Egypt, edited by Cäcilia Fluck and Gisela Helmecke, Leiden, 2006, pp. 141–42, no. 6 (only the word "rejoice"); Cäcilia Fluck, Petra Linscheid, and Susanne Merz. Textilien aus Ägypten, vol. 1, Textilien aus dem Vorbesitz von Theodor Graf, Carl Schmidt und dem Ägyptischen Museum Berlin. Wiesbaden, 2000, p. 234, no. 166.
13. For related pieces see Annemarie Stauffer. Textiles d’Égypte de la collection Bouvier = Textilien aus Ägypten aus der Sammlung Bouvier. Exh, cat. Fribourg, 1991, p. 184, cat. no. 86; Cäcilia Fluck. "Koptische Textilien mit Inschriften in Berlin – II. Teil." Bulletin de la Société d’Archéologie Copte 36 (1997), pp. 59, 61, 63–64, 67, 69; similar bands in tapestry weaving: Ernst Kühnel and Louisa Bellinger. Catalogue of Dated Tiraz Fabrics: Umayyad, Abbasid, Fatimid. Washington, D.C., 1952, p. 83, pl. XLIII (above).
Inscription: In Coptic, one line on each piece, only single words are legible: (piece 1) This is...Misael [name?] use it in happiness; (from piece 2 onto piece 3) and rejoice...this [word written twice] in...
Emil Brugsch-Bey(until 1890; sold to Baker); George F. Baker, New York (1890; gifted to MMA)
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Byzantium and Islam: Age of Transition," March 14–July 8, 2012, no. 124B.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Africa & Byzantium," November 13, 2023–March 3, 2024.
Cleveland Museum of Art. "Africa & Byzantium," April 14–July 21, 2024.
Evans, Helen C., and Brandie Ratliff, ed. Byzantium and Islam: Age of Transition. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2012. no. 124B, pp. 183–84, ill. (color).
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