Lot 122. An Ottoman silk and metal thread brocade (kemha) fragment, Turkey, late 16th-early 17th century; 49 by 57cm. Estimate: 3,000 - 5,000 GBP. Courtesy Sotheby's.

woven with a cerise ground with interlacing and overlapping stylised foliate design with cintamani and floral motif, with silver metal thread wrapped yellow silk, white, black, green and blue silk threads details, stapled old collector’s printed card label handwritten ’96 Lampas oriental satin rouge à arabesques or & soie, 55/57, IMP.B.ARNAUD_LYON_PARIS’.

Property from a distinguished French private collection.

Note: For an example of a kemha fabric with similar colouring and design, dated to the mid-sixteenth century, from the Victoria and Albert Museum, see N. Gürsu, The Art of Turkish Weaving, Designs through the Ages, Istanbul, 1988, p.80, pl.75. The intersection of the cintamani, stem and leaves are comparable to the section on the present panel, repeated in two sections up the right side, both in gold, with blue highlights, dark edging, and on a cerise ground. Another comparable is in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, inv. no.52.50.50 (Atasoy, Denny, Mackie, Tezcan 2001, pp.288-9).