A Study on the Emergence of the Art of Coin Embroidery in Iranian Women's Clothing during the Safavid Era

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

1 Assistant Professor, Educational Department of Textile Design and Printing, Faculty of Arts, Semnan University, Semnan, Iran

2 Lecturer of Technical and Vocational University, Shahrood, Iran

Abstract

The use of coin-embroidered clothing in Iranian women's clothing became common during the last five centuries as an imported culture. Explaining the factors of popularization of this art in the last five centuries of Iran will also be part of the purpose of this research. The use of coins with the design of birds, with the idea of receiving hidden forces in the designs engraved on the coins, which was mixed with shamanic beliefs, it created a belief among Iranian women that led to the widespread use of coin embroidery among these women. This article has been written in a descriptive-analytical manner and based on Michel Foucault's theory of power discourse in order to achieve the acceptance of the imported culture of coin embroidery among Qajar, Safavid and pre-Qajan women. The results confirm that following the acquaintance of Iranian women with the coin-embroidered cover of Turkish women who entered Iran extensively during the Safavid period under the name of Ghezelbash, with the same goal of receiving transcendental forces, the motifs on the coins were used. They made new designs with Iranian identity and nature, such as fish, which were considered sacred in Iranian culture.

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