Saddle Blanket Featuring Crescent Moon and Pearl Roundell Patterns (500 - 700)

Among the many equestrian ornamental accoutrements in ancient Eurasia was a decorative blanket or cloth which covered the saddle. Tang Dynasty pottery statues of horses often depict these cloths hanging in sweeping folds down the sides of the animal.

Rarely are these artifacts recovered in such fine condition as the example seen here. Lavishly embroidered with pearl rondelles and crescent moon shapes, the imagery is associated with both Islamic and pre-Islamic cultures, particularly the Sassanid Empire, which once encompassed modern day Iran.

Radiocarbon analysis of the saddle cloth confirmed the age to be between 560 and 660 CE, during the height of the Sassanian Empire, and overlapping the life of the prophet Muhammad (ca. 570-632), upon whose teachings the Islamic faith is based.