Exhibitions/ Art Object

Pattern Sheet with Diaper Design

5th–6th century
Made in Egypt
Credit Line:
Not on view
Silks were woven in many designs. One widely popular type was a diaper pattern that used a latticelike organizational scheme with narrow intersecting diagonal bands to create rhomboid or square fields filled with various motifs.
The diaper pattern on this papyrus fragment, a pattern sheet for the woven decoration of a tunic, is similar to contemporary Persian silks. The dissemination of papyrus templates such as this and the textiles based on them perhaps contributed to the spread of Persian motifs in other media, such as mosaics.