Scarf
Unknown Artist
early 1900s
Medium
Probably cotton and silver-plated copper foil
Dimensions
221 × 82.2 cm
Classification
Garment
Department
Textiles
Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art
Credit
Gift of Mrs. Edward N. Dekker, Sr.
Accession Number
1974.1058
About this artwork
Egyptians may have innovated tulle-bi-telli (“net with metal,” also called assiut) after the French introduced machine-made netted fabric (tulle) in the late 1800s. It drew from telli, an earlier metal embroidery technique. Diamond and rectangle designs formed by knotting flattened silver wire into black tulle indicate this scarf’s early age in the genre. Urban Egyptian singers and dancers performed in heavy, shimmering tulle-bi-telli costumes during the late 1800s through the mid-1900s. Elite E...