In Leningrad, we took three furtive hours from the conference to look for rug books off Nevsky Prospect. To no avail. There simply were no rug books to be had, not for dollars nor rubles. And yet there have been many good rug books published in the U.S.S.R. that any of us would love to add to our libraries. If was rumored that Russian books published before 1976, if found, could not be exported. We were unable to substantiate whether or not this were true. Shortly after returning to the United States, we visited a favorite rug book dealer and found a Soviet publication that we wonder in retrospect why we couldn't find in Leningrad. The book is The Kirghiz Pattern, published in 1986 in Russian, Kirghiz, and English. Except for size, 8"x 11", it is the closest to a coffee table book that we have seen from the Soviet Union.

It is a glorious celebration in prose and photographs of Kirghiz design. It is divided into three sections. The first, "The Sources," is a juxtaposition of landscape photos and close-up details of Kirghiz craft designs. It is this section which puts it into the coffee table category.

The second part is "The White Yurta." This is the core of the book and the one which should be of greatest interest to anyone who is a collector of Central Asian weavings. In this section a whole panoply of yurt artifacts are described and illustrated. They include felt door coverings, chij (or chikhs), floor felts of several different techniques, various tent bands (terme, gajari), embroideries on felt, fabric and leather, purses, towels, and macrame bands and bags, leather holders, wooden boxes, carved doors, and musical instruments. It is a beautiful selection of old items from the Kirghiz culture. The next chapter, "Silver is Speaking," is about the jewelry items of the Kirghiz and other festive items of female attire and that of the horse.

The final chapter, "Guarding Means Creating," comes as a surprise because it reveals the reason for the publication, which is the promotion of modern handicrafts from Kirghizia. And that is not all bad. The book documents the best of a culture's historic crafts and modern day adaptations of them. Can you imagine small yurt chikhs as place mats? Not a bad idea for the modern day continuation of this craft. Or embroidered "Tyrolean" style felt hats for those trout fishing club pins?

The Kirghiz Pattern is a well-produced book, and surprisingly it is not from the premier art publishing house of Aurora. We recommend it for the excellent yurt materials shown and for the photography. The English text requires careful reading. and knowledge because it is not a learned translation. But the spirit is there, if not the syntax. At $45 it is good material to look at and enjoy.

Of specific interest to readers of Oriental Rug Review is an illustrated article by George O'Bannon describing a class of early 20th century Ersari Turkoman rugs, few of which have been previously published. He also establishes a firm basis for dating these rugs, some of which had been incorrectly cataloged. Through the discovery of a dedicatory rug in 1979, O'Bannon determined that the Islamic solar calendar, rather than the lunar calendar, was used by the weavers of these rugs. This dates them approximately 40 years later than had been previously thought. (This article was originally presented at the Fifth International Conference on Oriental Carpets, Vienna, Austria, in September, 1986.)

Six of the articles describe and analyze: Soviet efforts at the communization of Afghanistan; the resistance movement; the negative impact of the war and refugee existence on traditional nomadic and sedentary populations; the weakening of the Afghan family structure; and the role of voluntary private agencies in refugee relief work in Pakistan. Other articles include a description of the life of a Peace Corps volunteer in Herat in the mid-1960s, and the eulogies of seven Afghan and American statesmen and scholars. The volume concludes with a review of Olivier Roy's Islam and Resistance in Afghanistan, 1986.

This first issue of the journal is clearly the product of much dedication and serious work on the part of many people who have invested much of themselves in Afghanistan. The volume's contents, format, and style reflect this. All of the elements are there: scholarship, polemics, nostalgia, and even a touch of the whimsical.

Martin Kumorek, reviewer

The Afghanistan Studies Journal is available from Center for Afghanistan Studies, The University of Nebraska at Omaha, Nebraska 68182-0006. Produced semi-annually, the subscription fee is $12 per year.

Floor Coverings for Historic Buildings provides the home owner or curator with an important compilation of sources and gives a much-needed overview of the technology and manufacture of soft woven floor coverings from the Colonial and early Federal Period (1750-1800) through the period of modern interiors of 1900-1930.

The book is organized into five historic chronological periods or chapters. Each chapter features a brief history of the types of floor coverings available during the period and then lists and illustrates suitable reproductions and adaptations available today.

The design of the book is very attractive with well coordinated text and illustrations which make it easy and pleasant to use. While all such source books require constant revision to remain current, the thorough and well written section on the development of weaving technology in the 19th and 20th centuries will greatly extend the book's usefulness as a basic reference work on the subject.

Those of us in the Oriental rug business may be dismayed by the authors' stress on machine-made reproduction Oriental carpets for use in the historic building to the total exclusion of noting the availability of handmade bona fide Oriental rugs woven in traditional patterns. One could argue that the exact Karastan copies of the 16th and 17th century workshop Ushaks and Bird rugs are more appropriate for the table tops at Winterthur and Williamsburg than available contemporary handmade rugs from modern Turkish or other Middle Eastern production. The authors, of course, accept the popular notion that original period textiles should not be subjected to actual floor use or other types of uncontrolled public exhibition. For historic houses and buildings of the late 19th century, however, it seems somewhat misguided to recommend machine-made copies of commonly available Feraghans and Hamadans with Herati fields, when many contemporary Oriental rugs are woven in this or other appropriate designs.

While the authors mention the widespread use of Oriental rugs of all types in the homes of this period, they do not mention the fact that Oriental rugs with suitable designs are still being made and imported today. Why advise someone to buy a Karastan machine-made copy when they have the correct option of buying a handmade contemporary piece made in the same tradition and with more inherent value than the very static machine-made copies illustrated in the book?

Louise Woodhead, reviewer

Floor Coverings for Historic Buildings, by Gail Caskey Winkler and Helene von Ronsenstiel, contains 284 pages, 175 illustrations, a bibliography, appendix, and index. Priced at $12.95, it may be purchased from booksellers or ordered by mail from Preservation Shops, National Trust for Historic Preservation, 1600 H Street, N. W., Washington, D.C. 20006 (add $3 for postage and handling).

Here are design drawings showing elements characteristic of different weaving centers, superb color photographs of rugs typical of these centers, and detailed maps to the areas. Exquisite line drawings accompany the text showing all the steps in rug weaving, from the sheep to the finished rug. Also there is helpful advice on buying and caring for Navajo rugs. A native of New Mexico, H.L. James began collecting rugs in 1960, recognizing their significance as works of art. Thanks to his other interest, photography, we have this important and interesting work. This 160-page soft cover work, complete with 80 color as well as many black-and-white photographs and drawings, sells for $19.95.