Is that word Persian for "flying"?

August 26, 2008 9:21 PM

Help me identify my rug! It has a label on the back that says "OSMAN" across the top, with a picture of a mosque and some Arabic or Persian writing along the bottom. Where was it made, and what does the label say?

I got it cheap on craigslist, and the seller didn't know much about it. I don't expect that it's some rare, valuable treasure; I'd just like to know what the label says and where it is from. Thanks!

posted by pmann to Home & Garden (12 answers total)

"Osman" is a Turkish word - a guy's name and also the Turkish equivalent of "Ottoman" as in the Ottoman Empire. (More or less, anyway; Turkish is an agglutinative language, so it's really probably the root of the word "Ottoman" in Turkish.)

I can't read the writing, but my guess would be that it's Urdu and the rug was made in Pakistan, where there seems to be an appropriation of Turkishness within the rug industry, hence the name Osman. But it's just a guess. It's an industrial-made rug, obviously.
posted by Dee Xtrovert at 9:33 PM on August 26, 2008

A quick Google search led me to a Turkish carpet vendor called Sisko Osman. It might be worth it to email them and see if the label on your carpet matches the ones that they put on their products.

Also, I tried to read the writing, but couldn't because it's not Arabic... at least, not completely. There are some words that I know are either Urdu or Persian because the letters don't appear in the Arabic alphabet, but on second glance, I think I might have an idea of what the bottom line says after all. It looks as though it may translate to: "Country of origin: Belgium." Just as a warning, though, my Arabic translations are never 100% accurate right before I go to bed, so if anyone else reads that line differently, please feel free to correct me!
posted by sabira at 10:44 PM on August 26, 2008

I looked at it some more and here's what else I have now: The part on the left side of the top line may translate to "Quality: __________." I can't find my Arabic dictionary at the moment and Google's translator can really be hit-or-miss, but I'm pretty sure that word is correct, or somewhere close to it. Now, the part that follows the colon is where I get lost because it's either a Persian/Urdu word that I can't read, or it's someone's name.

And one last thing before I sign off for the night: The writing on the right side of the top line looks like it may translate to something along the lines of "Height of the _______: 8 _____ meters." Again, I hope that someone else can come along and fill in the missing pieces here. Once I track down my dictionary, it'll be a lot easier to look up all the possible meanings of each word to find the best fit, since most online translators only give one word and leave it at that. I'll check back in sometime tomorrow and let you know if I've been able to make any additional progress with this!
posted by sabira at 11:00 PM on August 26, 2008

If made in or imported to Belgium (per Sabira's suggestion) by an Osman firm, it could be these guys, who have a website sans content. ("oosterse tapijten" means "oriental carpets") Then again, Osman is probably a pretty common name.
posted by beagle at 5:32 AM on August 27, 2008

Well I can tell you for certain that it is definitely not a Persian rug and that the writing on the label is not in Farsi.

I do see the reference to Belgium on the bottom of the label. This is either from Morocco or Pakistan in my best estimation. Also, the translation to the writing on the top right line is from what I can tell is that the thickness is 8 millimeters. Also the second line states that the weight is 1750 grams and there is another reference on the left hand side to something being 7 millimeters (I can't make out what the word it is referring to is though).

Hope this helps!
posted by lrkuperman at 6:30 AM on August 27, 2008

My guess is that it is a machine made cotton rug originally from Egypt where many of these Persian rug factories are located. It may be a copy of famous Persian varieties made by hand (and who are made by children).
posted by Brian B. at 6:39 AM on August 27, 2008

i say it's urdu too. it lists the rug's dimensions (8x7 meters), and weight (1750 grams). there's one other item (i'm guessing material) that i can't make out. the last item listed is place of manufacture/origin, but i can't read the name. it looks kinda like belgium to me too, tho.
posted by asras at 8:01 AM on August 27, 2008

on second look, the item i couldn't make out says "Quality" [as sabira said before], and after the colon it says polypropylene.
posted by asras at 8:16 AM on August 27, 2008

Ms Booth, who is an oriental carpet dealer and knows a thing or two about these things, says this: "It's a machine-made carpet, the design is a Persian Kashan." She agrees that this is not a "rare, valuable treasure."
posted by booth at 10:41 AM on August 27, 2008

Thank you all for the information! I am more or less completely ignorant of carpets and Urdu (and all other Perso-Arabic script languages), so this is a great help.
posted by pmann at 9:05 PM on August 27, 2008

"a machine made cotton rug originally from Egypt where many of these Persian rug factories are located"

But then those wouldn't be Persian rug factories!

:-)

FWIW, I can concur with the parts that sabrina and asras have deciphered -- It's not Persian, but the phonetic words (millimeter, polypropylene [!], Belgique, gram, etc) can be made sense of.
posted by Dr. Sam at 10:20 PM on August 27, 2008

But then those wouldn't be Persian rug factories!

Maybe this is obvious, but these days "Persian rug" is more likely to mean a rug with a pattern that's traditionally Persian - like this one - not where it was made.
posted by booth at 5:29 AM on August 28, 2008