tunisian crafts 1

Carpet

Kairouan is the first center of manufacture while employing more than 23.000 people (especially young women) on a working total of 28.000 in the sector of the craft industry. The tradition allots to a girl of an Othoman governor of Kairouan the introduction in Tunisia, in 1830, carpet at tied points of Anatolian inspiration. However, the oldest traces of carpet go up in Ve front century J. - C. with the famous Carthaginian tapestries tinted with the murex. In VIIIe century, the emir aghlabide paid the tribute with the caliph de Bagdad out of carpet. The uses of the carpet are multiple, whether it is in the mediums townsman, countryman or nomad: saddle, groundsheet, prayer, carpet of decoration, etc One distinguishes today several types of typical carpets of the Tunisian craft industry: The carpet strictly speaking is also specified carpet of Kairouan because its manufacture started at the XIXe century in this city of the center of Tunisia. Even if the manufacture of carpet relates to other cities such as Ksibet el-Médiouni, Gabès or Bizerte, Kairouan remains the principal center of manufacture. Contrary to the mergoum and the kilim, it is about a carpet of tied points not woven. It is manufactured containing wool or of cotton (in particular for the screen and the chain) and more rarely of flax. It can be coloured in the natural colors of the white to chestnut while passing by the beige gray when it is of alloucha type (standard original). The wool is always thick, because it is that of the sheep, but one can use the hair of the dromedary or the goat. Its dimensions are variable, in a rectangular composition, of 70 by 140 cm up to 300 by 400 cm. Its texture, defined by the number of points tied per m ², spreads out between 12.000 and 490.000 but the standard is of 40.000, i.e. 20 lines by 20 lines. The composition of the carpet is made of a broad rectangular central field framed by edges made up of parallel bands. The field has broad corner pieces which delimit a hexagonal field. The reasons are geometrical but can also be stylized flowers, giving to the unit a symmetrical aspect with prevalence of the form of the rhombus. During the XXe century, the alloucha type evolves to more complexity and by polychromy, texture increases and the Persian influences are felt with the appearance of the recognizable zarbia to its color brown-red. The mergoum: it is a short-pile carpet of wool often made up on a red content with Berber reasons (regma). Its place of production of origin is the town of Oudhref close to Gabès which gives him sometimes its name. The kilim which translates a strong Turkish influence left by the period of domination Ottoman. Tapestries: one finds them with a large variety of colors in certain cities of the Tunisian South such as Gafsa and Tataouine. Ceramics And Pottery The art of the pottery and ceramics is thousand-year-old in Tunisia which knows two types of pottery: a pottery turned by the men and another modelled by the women: the latter meets only in rural environment; it is primarily utility. Modelling, the cooking and the decoration of these potteries are remained primitive. The lines, the points, the ciliés features, the teeth of saw, the crosses, the rhombuses are as many reasons which point out tattooings and rural fabrics of wool. When with the turned pottery, it seems that they are the potters of Jerba which were the first to use the turn since the most moved back times. They hold their improvement of this art of old Egypt, Phénicie, Greece and Rome. In fact also the potters of Guellala (Jerba) are at the origin of the creation of other centers potters in the Tunisian littoral. Tunis, Nabeul, Moknine them must have given birth to there an of the same production invoices than that of Jerba. But if the porous pottery “chaouat” is identified in Guellala, that enamelled, yellow, green or brown, is synonymous with Nabeul. The potters of this city owe their fame with this technique. The use of the glazes and metallic oxides came from Baghdad at the time aghlabide (IX ème century). Ceramics Fatimide and Zirîde (IX ème century is characterized by a representational art devoting the representation of human figures and animals. This art was spread in the of the same Maghreb countries Q' in Andalusia and Sicily.  From the XVII ème century Tunisian ceramics is subject to strongly the Turkish influence: the ceramists tunisois, installed with Qallaline, produce a polychrome ceramics pointing out that of Turkey Ottmane.    Nowadays, ceramics knows a true rebirth. The development of the sector of the building gave him a new strength by allowing the emergence of a great number of artisanal manufacturing units as well as industrial. But ceramics is not limited to the utility functions since it has an increasingly important place in the play activities of the Tunisian plastics technicians who regard it more as art with whole share than like simple technique.