SALOR RUG

floor covering handmade by the Salor Turkmens of Turkmenistan. Most examples are designed as jovals, the faces of large storage bags. The gul, or specific tribal motif, is an octagon surrounded and lined with little triangular projections, presumably vestiges of a knotted outline as seen in Holbein rugs and rugs depicted in Timurid Persian miniature paintings. The secondary motifs that appear between the guls are usually groups of squares in a diagonal format, each containing a star. A variety of madder reds are used in these jovals, and often red or pink silk is employed freely in the guls. Rugs of good size are sometimes seen, perhaps somewhat later in date, and in these the reds are apt to have more of a purplish cast. White grounds have been found among these 20th-century rugs. Salor rugs are all wool or goat hair, in Senna (Sehna) knotting. The jovals in particular are excellently woven, with short pile as in the Tekke carpets.