An Indo-Portuguese embroidered panel, India

Overall measurements: 193cm across the top, 191cm across the bottom, 270cm the left hand side, 268cm the right hand side. Overall in very good condition, The ground is two layers. Some slight discolouration to the ground, visible in the photograph (for example to the ground area in top left quadrant towards the centre, visible as slightly darker area), and a couple of small spot stains. Embroidery variously worked through either the top layer of the fabric, e.g. the faces or both layers e.g. the greens. Some minor losses of the light coloured threads used in motifs, such as the white faces. Embroidery worked in golden yellow, pale blue, ivory, pale walnut (possibly safflower as some traces of darker peachy orange), golden walnut and red. Embroidery generally in remarkable condition, original fringing. Cotton fleece backing probably later. Occasional hanging hoops to reverse. Might benefit from a judicious clean, overall ready to use or display.
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Probably intended as an alcatifa de estrado, a cover for the low platform, a legacy from Mudejar architecture, where ladies would sit to embroider and socialise, and which was still in use in Portugal and Spain in the 16th and 17th centuries. For examples in the Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga, Lisbon see Inv. nos. 1926tec and 2225tec. It is recorded that Gujarat, Bengal and the Coromandel coast were leading textile centres from early antiquity, and supplied international markets. It was the Portuguese on their arrival in the in the late 16^th century that led the interest in the adaptation of designs for the European market, almost a century before the Dutch and British. The European market textile panels (colchas) commissioned, were often worked in light yellow tash silk on linen, and incorporated elements and motifs representative of different cultures and faiths, with some figures and fantastical creatures, and marked borders. Some of the Indian textile designs that influenced the Portuguese included the Bengali flat scrollwork designs, seen on the present panel, which also included hunting scenes, and the Portuguese adapted their designs. In the case of the popular theme of birds and branches, the influential textiles could well have been Persian, with examples such as 17^th century Safavid silks, including those with repeat patterns of roses and green parakeets (see fragment in David Collection: Copenhagen Inv.no.33/1922). The Portuguese Augustines were active in Iran from 1572 until 1747, and therefore textiles they saw were used initially to inspire their famous tile designs, for example those with similar exuberant flowerheads, parrots and birds, for tiled altar frontals such as those for the chapel in the Convento da Graça, Lisbon, and those in the tomb of Christian Frederik, Roskilde Cathedral. The European components gradually increasing and being adapted in the design, which in this example could include the masks and the double headed eagle (Symbolic of the Holy Roman Emperor). The inclusion of the small tiger motifs in the design, allude to Indian influences. The present example is not of the style typical of the later Portuguese, European inspired and designed, Indian made pieces, 17^th/18^th century which are typically worked in saffron yellow, with designs with combinations of figures, Biblical and mythological, in central and corner medallions, and the present panel may be a transitional example or specific commission inspired by other textile designs.

Related Literature:

Hallet, Jessica, ‘From the looms of Yazd and Isphahan: Persian carpets and textiles in Portugal’, VI., pp. 90-123, Safavid textiles and Portuguese tiles, pp.117-119, figs. 15 & 17., Thompson, Jon, Shaffer, Daniel, Mildh, Pirjetti, (ed), Carpets and Textiles in the Iranian World 1400-1700, Proceedings of the Conference held at the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, 30-31 August 2003, for The May Beattie Archive, Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford, in association with The Bruschettini Foundation for Islamic and Asian Art, Genoa, 2010

Mendes Pinto, MH,aassos Leite, M.F. & Barros, Carlos, Artes decorativas portuguesas no Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga : séculos XV-XVIII, Secretaria de Estado da Cultura, Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga, 1979.

Silva, da, J.F., Nascimento, Leitos e Camilhas Portugueses: Subsídios para o seu estudo, 1950, pl.CXXIX, fig. 135, for a panel with overall scrolls and double-headed eagles, 17th/18th century (Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga, Lisbon).

Barbara Karl, ‘Marvellous things are made with needles’: Bengal colchas in European inventories, c. 1580–1630, Journal of the History of Collections, Volume 23, Issue 2, 1 November 2011, pp. 301–313.