The oldest Iranian carpet was discovered in 1949 in the second stage of the Russian archaeological excavations by Rudenko in the Pazyryk region and was named the Pazyryk carpet.
In a book published in Russia in 1953 on the occasion of these discoveries, Rudenko wrote a detailed description of the discovered carpet and explicitly stated that it was the work of Iran and the oldest Iranian carpet in the world.
He wrote: “Without being able to say with certainty whether this carpet was made in the lands of Media, Parthia (ancient Khorasan) or Persia, the date of the mentioned carpet and the fabrics discovered in Pazyryk can be determined to be the fifth or early fourth century BC.”
Then he adds: “The date of this rug is determined by the figure of the horsemen. The way war horses are depicted,
with a carpet spread on their backs instead of a saddle, and the cloth on the horse’s chest are characteristic of the Assyrians, but various details on the Pazyryk carpet and the way the horses’ tails are tied are also seen in the bas-reliefs of Persepolis.”
