Pechonaband headpiece, 20th century.

Fine Arts Institute, Tashkent, Uzbekistan.

 

 

Leatherwork

 

Leather goods had a particular place amongst the traditional practical objects of the tribes of Central Asia in the 18th to early 19th century. The raw material was the skin of various animals, used for pale green shagreen, tanned youfte (Russian leather), morocco and suede. Rich procedures for the ornamentation of objects had been elaborated: stamping, embroidery, the use of tanned leather or silver plates adorned with niello.

 

The artistic working of leather was not only well known to nomads, but also in the big towns of Central Asia. In the noisy marketplaces of Bukhara and Samarkand, expert craftsmen embroidered suede hunting-trousers, fur boots, cushions, wallets, and belts for men, whilst the client watched. Horse harnesses were carefully adorned. The covers and the leather harness were adorned with silver plates, little spherical bells embellished with niello, cornaline and turquoise inlays. The stamped ornaments of bookcovers and paper-files used by scientists and theologians were elegantly refined. Yet one can observe an excessive ornamentation of leather objects from the end of the 19th to the beginning of the 20th century.

 

Traditional forms and a pureness of style were characteristic of the leather objects made by the Kyrgyz, the Kazakhs, and the Karakalpaks, who had lived a uniquely nomadic life in the past. Besides clothes and the horse’s harness which were made of leather, crockery for the preservation of koumys (fermented mare’s milk) was also made of leather. After being treated, the hides were tanned and sewn. The container thus obtained was filled with earth or sand, and on the damp surface of the hide a decoration was drawn with a sharp stick. When the form and the designs had dried, the earth was removed and the object smoked for several days in smokehouses especially constructed for this purpose. The form was then filled with water to clean it from the smoke and soot.