Carpets
training center
Less than a few kilometers from Memphis, the 5000-year-old capital city of Pharaonic Egypt, modern day some Egyptians strive to keep alive a fast dying tradition, that too is nearly 1500-years old — the legendary art of weaving ‘magic’ carpets.
weaving in old Egyptian hieroglyphs
The magic carpets of Asia, which have found mention everywhere from ancient
texts to Uderzo and Goscinny’s Asterix comics have long been the hallmark of
Persians and Arabs who took over the reigns of Egypt from the Romans in 640
AD.
But today this art is facing the danger of dying out with the younger
generation, much like in Kashmir, more interested in ‘proper jobs’ than in
learning to make carpets. But Egypt, it seems, is not willing to give up just
yet.
Because of the population explosion, the school systems can’t handle the
quantity and run two sessions a day. Therefore, children go to school for just a
half-day and the other half day learn a craft such as carpet weaving
There are more than 200 carpet schools, each of them training some 40-odd school
children this ancient art. All of these children go to school and are getting a
proper education.
It has to be seen to be believed, the way a design or a picture takes shape —
woven purely by hand, as children sitting in front of different boards — weave
with their small fingers — intricate and identical designs on huge silk and
woolen carpets.
It takes weeks, often months to make a single carpet. Imagine the kind of
patience and dedication one must have to make carpets for a living. Each design
has to be identical on a carpet. So the children must be excellent artists and
good with their hands. Their small and flexible fingers, can be the best
weavers.
The children go to these schools either every summer vacation which lasts three
months, or after finishing their school day and homework. It takes four summers
for each of them to emerge as sort of ‘graduates’ after which they can go in for
higher training.
To create a simple design like that of a peacock or a flower on one single
square meter of a woolen or silk carpet, one needs to tie an amazing one million
knots.
The scheme has been very successful. We are confident now that the art of the
magic carpet will not die in Egypt.
winding the yarn
the finished carpets
showing the expensive silk carpet
display of theme carpets
Ottoman scene
Egyptian Temple
traditional design
my favorite
(a Bukara design,
Uzbekistan in Central Asia)
ready for the buyers