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The largest and grandest of the Ushak designs is that of the Medallion Ushak carpets, which makes its earliest appearance in a painting of the English royal family, at Sudeley Castle, about 1570. Obviously inspired by Persian medallion carpets, it is none the less in most respects thoroughly Turkish in feeling. Comparison with Turkish tile-work suggests that the original design was made about the second quarter or middle of the 16th century. Though on a very large scale; the design is treated as a repeating pattern based on the alternation of two main motifs. One is a large pointed oval medallion which invariably appears in the centre of the carpet, sometimes with part of another similar medallion appearing at each end. The other is a composite star-like medallion of sixteen points, which invariably appears at the sides of the carpet, so that only about half of any example is visible. Both types of medallion are filled with compositions of arabesques and plant ornament. Both have large finials projecting from the ends and the star-like medallion also has smaller finials projecting at the sides. The ground, which is quite restricted in relation to the large size of the medallions, is covered with a restless pattern of stems, leaves and lotus-flowers, apparently inspired by Chinese textile patterns. There is hardly a straight line anywhere in the design — a remarkable and revolutionary change from the rigid geometry of older Anatolian rugs! The design is eclectic, masterly, majestic, indeed a stupendous performance.
At all events, the design was immensely successful. Medallion Ushak carpets were evidently exported in great numbers and they are to be seen in paintings from most western European countries — in works, for example, by Zurbaran, Velasquez, Vermeer and Terborch — down to the second half of the 17th century, and even occasionally in the 18th. They came in many varieties. Some of the earliest and best of the extant examples have a dark blue ground with ivory flowers, the oval medallion in red and the star-like medallion in blue. Others have a red ground (as in the painting of 1570) with blue flowers and dark blue medallions. Ivory medallions are also found (Berlin and the Keir Collection). The design was modified and simplified in various ways. Copies were produced in Europe - in Spain and in Poland. Versions of the pattern continued to be made in Anatolia down to the 19th century, some of them perhaps in the Ushak area, which might provide some justification for the attribution of the earlier carpets to that area also. But on the whole it seems wiser to regard the Ushak designation simply as a convenient group-name, not as an attribution, for which the evidence is negligible. Wherever they were made, the weaving of the large Medallion Ushak carpets, with their immensely complex and continuously curvilinear designs, must have required large and well-organized workshops, presumably in a flourishing urban environment.
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