5'6" x 9' Persian Kord Bijar Rug | All-over Deer and Bird Design | Dense Wool Pile

Animal rugs are not common in Kurdish weaving, which is what makes this Persian Kord Bijar rug worth stopping on. The brick red field is populated with standing deer, long-tailed birds and flowering branches, and three ivory and sky blue lobed medallions run up the center line rather than the single centerpiece you usually see. The handle is pure Bijar: a heavy cotton foundation, a short 3/8" wool clip, and a body so compact it lies down flat the moment you unroll it. At 5'6" x 9" the proportions suit the way people actually live, and among 6x9 Persian rugs this one carries far more drawing than its size suggests. Condition is excellent, with full even pile and original ends and sides, and it ships with our certificate of authenticity.

Design and Motifs

The field is an all-over animal design: deer with raised heads, pairs of birds perched on and flying between flowering stems, and large serrated leaves and rosettes filling the ground between them. Three lobed medallions sit on the vertical axis, each one outlined in sky blue with an ivory ground, a small navy and salmon 8 petal rosette at the center, and hooked finials extending top and bottom. The animals are drawn in ivory, cream and pale blue so they read clearly against the red, and they are placed in loose mirrored pairs rather than a rigid repeat, which gives the field movement. Two guard systems frame it. The inner guard is a broad sky blue band carrying its own procession of birds, deer and open blossoms, a nice touch that continues the story of the field into the border. The main border is navy, drawn with palmettes, cloudband forms and a continuous vine, and the outer salmon band repeats a small reciprocal motif that finishes the edge neatly at all 4 corners.

A Closer Look at the Colors

The ground is a warm brick red that leans toward terracotta where the light catches the clipped pile, with a subtle tonal variation across the width that only hand-dyed wool produces. Against it, the navy main border is deep and almost ink dark, reading as near black at a distance, and it anchors the whole rug. The sky blue of the inner guard is the surprise: a soft, slightly chalky light blue that lifts the red and repeats inside the medallion outlines. Ivory and cream carry the deer, the birds and the medallion grounds, with a few flowers in pale yellow and soft gold. Salmon and peach appear in the outer band and in scattered blossoms, and there are small passages of muted green in the leaves and in the border rosettes. The back photograph shows how clean the dye lots are, with the rust, navy and salmon knots reading just as crisply from below as they do on the surface.

Bijar, the Iron Rug of Persia

Bijar sits in Kordestan in northwest Persia, and the Kurdish weavers of the town and its surrounding villages built a reputation on construction rather than fineness. The wefts are beaten down with a heavy metal comb while the rug is still on the loom, compressing the knots until the body is dense, stiff and nearly indestructible, which is how Bijar earned the name iron rug of Persia. The local mountain wool is tough and lanolin rich, so the pile resists crushing and takes on a dry luster with use. Kord Bijar pieces like this one are the village end of that tradition, drawn with more freedom than workshop work, and the animal field here is a weaver's own invention rather than a copied cartoon. If you are comparing pieces, our article on the difference between Bijar, Bijar Zanjan, Bijar Tekab and Bijar Bukan explains how the weaving districts differ in handle, palette and drawing.