Curtain for the Door of the Ka‘bah

Location: Cairo, Egypt; commissioned by Sultan Selim III

Materials: black silk, with coloured silk appliqués, relief-embroidered in silver and silver-gilt wire over cotton thread padding; the patterned silk panels are later additions

Dimensions: 508 x 237cm

Accession Number: TXT 381

Script:

The commissioning notice is embroidered in silver on a gold background within two narrow panels at the top of the opening for the door. Below it, a panel with a zigzag pattern, which is normally embroidered, is here replaced by a 20th-century woven fabric similar to that used for the curtain made for the external wall of the Prophet’s tomb in Medina. The tughra of Sultan Selim appears in a the red tear drop-shaped cartouche. Compare with TXT 352.