Before
marriage, while mastering the textile arts, young girls create
the ceyiz, a dowry collection of beautiful things that will be
useful in their future homes. A girl might knit socks and create
a heybe, a saddlebag, for her husband to carry over his shoulder
at the market in a public display of her domestic skills; she
will embroider towels and weave pillows, carpets and
wallhangings. Her new home will be decorated with memories of
her girlhood and family. As she looks at her kilims she will see
herself and her sisters and her neighbors woven together in
affection. While creating the ceyiz in youth, the weaver makes
things that, if necessary, can later be sold to benefit her new
family.
Except
at harvest when all hands are busy in the fields, a carpet is
rising on the loom in every house, and when the sun is up, at
least two women are at work. Most weaving is done by girls and
women between the ages of 14 and 26 who form together into a
special community of work within each neighborhood of the
village. They move fluidly in and out of each other's homes with
no need to knock. They come to visit and when they visit, they
sit and weave. Their fathers and husbands are away in the fields
or sitting in the teahouse. A young girl learns gradually in
childhood by sitting beside her mother, her sister, the other
women of the village; she learns by watching and by absorbing
what is going on around her. The master weaver must begin to
learn early and build the art into her process of growth. In
this
way, she learns the habits of the hand that make the work
easy rather
than self-conscious, and thus gains the ability for
innovation and mastery.
As
young women move through the village, stopping to visit, weaving
while they visit, carpets accumulate the contributions of a wide
circle of friendship. Sitting to weave a spell with her friend,
the visitor might create an intentional inversion in a minor
motif or introduce a spot of surprising color. For the weaver it
is a hatra, or a memento of the time a girlhood friend stopped
by and helped for a while. The carpets record the friendships
and events of girlhood, and when the weaver leaves, taking the
carpets of her dowry with her to the village of her husband,
they will remind her of these times.
Before
marriage, while mastering the textile arts, young girls create
the ceyiz, a dowry collection of beautiful things that will be
useful in their future homes. A girl might knit socks and create
a heybe, a saddlebag, for her husband to carry over his shoulder
at the market in a public display of her domestic skills; she
will embroider towels and weave pillows, carpets and
wallhangings. Her new home will be decorated with memories of
her girlhood and family. As she looks at her kilims she will see
herself and her sisters and her neighbors woven together in
affection. While creating the ceyiz in youth, the weaver makes
things that, if necessary, can later be sold to benefit her new
family.
Except
at harvest when all hands are busy in the fields, a carpet is
rising on the loom in every house, and when the sun is up, at
least two women are at work. Most weaving is done by girls and
women between the ages of 14 and 26 who form together into a
special community of work within each neighborhood of the
village. They move fluidly in and out of each other's homes with
no need to knock. They come to visit and when they visit, they
sit and weave. Their fathers and husbands are away in the fields
or sitting in the teahouse. A young girl learns gradually in
childhood by sitting beside her mother, her sister, the other
women of the village; she learns by watching and by absorbing
what is going on around her. The master weaver must begin to
learn early and build the art into her process of growth. In
this 
As
young women move through the village, stopping to visit, weaving
while they visit, carpets accumulate the contributions of a wide
circle of friendship. Sitting to weave a spell with her friend,
the visitor might create an intentional inversion in a minor
motif or introduce a spot of surprising color. For the weaver it
is a hatra, or a memento of the time a girlhood friend stopped
by and helped for a while. The carpets record the friendships
and events of girlhood, and when the weaver leaves, taking the
carpets of her dowry with her to the village of her husband,
they will remind her of these times.