Rug - Caucasian Dragon Rug

Caucasian carpets dominate the carpet auction of the Ernst Museum, and the most remarkable of
these are the Armenian carpets. Armenian rug number 31, for example, could be the pride of any
museum. Its bold ornamentation and distinctive colouring make it a true masterpiece. Its surface is
adorned by dragons surrounded by large leaves, large palmettes, birds and lions struggling with
chamois. It has been dated to the late 16th or early 17th century.

We do not know who was selling the carpet at that time or who bought it, but six years later, in 1924, it appeared in the unillustrated descriptive list of the Museum of Applied Arts’ Early Oriental Carpets exhibition, marked as the property of a very sophisticated art collector, Zoltán Mauthner (1880-1936), the co-proprietor of the leather company Gebrüder Mauthner und Co. He probably purchased the carpet at the 1918 Ernst auction. He exhibited it in 1924 and sold it together with other items in his collection either at an auction or via an art dealer around 1930. That may have been when Mrs. Endler acquired it.

See also: Museum With No Frontiers