Textiles of Vaziri Museum from Safavid to Qajar Eras

Traditional textile weaving is one of the most ancient businesses, arts and industries in Iran. From the beginning of written history and even before, it has been found several witnesses of textile weaving activities. The initiation and continuation of this art-industry has always been affected by historical events. Today, there are many historical textiles around the world, while some of them have not been surveyed and analyzed yet. Since the method of production as well as patterns of each woven object is an important source to be used to determine social, economic, political and climatic conditions of the location of production, survey and analysis of these monuments can develop our knowledge about them and even reveal many secrets and answer many questions. The purpose of this study is analysis of textiles which are currently kept in Vaziri museum. Vaziri museum and library is an important cultural and historical center in Iran located in the city of Yazd. It contains many historical and precious monuments including:  coins, kings’ orders, containers, manuscripts, textiles and clothes from 6th century (Hijri) up to the era of Pahlavi II. The textiles of this museum, which are subject of this study, belong to Safavid, Zand, and Qajar dynasties. In this paper, the trend of changes in textile production in the mentioned periods is identified by analysis of the museum’s textiles from aspects of decoration, patterns and figures, paintings, thread materials, weaving methods, embroiders and their applications. Safavid period is considered as the golden age for art-industry of textile weaving and making fine clothes in the Islamic period of Iran history. In this period, textile weaving and cloth making have experienced prosperity and brightness, thanks to political, social, and economic conditions, internal security, and interest of Safavid kings in this art-industry as an important factor in local and international trade. After Safavid era, during early Qajar kingdom, the Safavid trend continues. But after that, due to expansion of relations with European countries, travels of businessmen and explorers to Iran, and also trips of Nasser al-Din Shah to Europe, many change occurred in this art-industry. These changes finally resulted in stagnation of this art-industry. Among changes in the art-industry of textile weaving after Safavid period are: simplification of weaving machines, usage of cheap and low quality materials, reduction of gold assay in braids, and usage of Russian textiles in repairing of clothes during Qajar period. These changes imply the effect of political, economic and social factors on decline and stagnation of this art-industry after Safavid period. In this research, the textiles of Vaziri museum are introduced, photographed, categorized and analyzed for the first time. The information of the research has been collected by field studies, library sources, interview with experts of Iranian traditional textile weaving and embroidery and consulting with experts from several museums. We hope that this research would interest the researchers to the Vaziri museum and its monuments, especially textiles and we hope that it will result in better keeping and maintaining of the monuments.