Embroidered quilt with pomegranates and tulips (1600s-1700s): Art, History and Details

Embroidered quilt with pomegranates and tulips (1600s-1700s) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

In Turkey, embroidered motifs were often adapted from Ottoman court art, especially luxury silks. Even the same six colors of silk thread were used: crimson or red, blue, green, and brown/black, plus yellow and white that replaced costly gilt- and silver-metal thread. In a typically bold style, pomegranates are framed by serrated leaves. Most of the original dark brown silk thread of the floral stems has disintegrated, revealing black ink outlines on the linen ground.

Object facts

• Title: Embroidered quilt with pomegranates and tulips
• Date: 1600s-1700s
• Culture: Turkey
• Type: Embroidery
• Technique: plain weave: linen; embroidery, running stitch: silk
• Dimensions: Average: 194.3 x 137.2 cm (76 1/2 x 54 in.)
• Collection: T - Islamic
• Department: Textiles
• Accession number: 1916.1300

Collection credit

Gift of Mr. and Mrs. J. H. Wade

Further reading listed by the museum

• Mackie, Louise W. Symbols of Power: Luxury Textiles from Islamic Lands, 7th-21st Century. Cleveland; New Haven: Cleveland Museum of Art; Yale University Press, 2015.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.