Before we begin to address the
subject of kilim nomenclature there is one point to be clarified,
mainly for those first entering the realm of the kilim. Although at
times you may find kilim rugs included in the general genre of "oriental
rugs", in more accepted practice kilim rugs are in a class of
their own, and it is then generally understood that the term "oriental
rug" refers to pile rugs, a category which includes carpets.
The difference between a kilim area rug and a carpet or a pile rug
is that whereas the design visible on the kilim is made by interweaving
the variously colored wefts and warps, thus creating what is known
as a flatweave, in a pile rug individual short strands of different
color, usually of wool, are knotted onto the warps and held together
by pressing the wefts tightly against each other. In this case the
whole design is made by these separately knotted strands which form
the pile, and the patterns become clearly visible after any excessive
lengths of the knotted materials are shorn off to create a level surface.
Having thus differentiated between
a kilim rug (pileless) and a carpet (with pile) you might think that's
all there's to it. Well, not quite.
All of you - all of us - interested in the subject have wandered the
cyber byways and noticed that the seemingly simple matter of finding
the proper definition of a kilim rug can lead to confusion. Let's
take a look at 'kilim' entries in two online sources generally taken
for granted as reliable, the Merriam-Webster Dictionary and Encyclopedia
Britannica.
Kilim, a word of Turkish origin,
denotes a pileless textile of many uses produced by one of several
flatweaving techniques that have a common or closely related heritage
and are practiced in the geographical area that includes parts of
Turkey (Anatolia and Thrace), North Africa, the Balkans, the Caucasus,
Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Central Asia and China.