$28,800. The finest weave in the sale, worked in the celebrated Mahi, or fish, pattern: a minutely repeated herati lattice covering a deep brown-black field, with a small stepped medallion at centre and ivory corner spandrels radiating outward. The herati takes its name from Herat and consists of a diamond enclosing a rosette, flanked by four lancet leaves whose curve suggested fish circling a pool to the weavers who named it. Tabriz, briefly the Safavid capital and the oldest continuously productive weaving city in Persia, is where the pattern reached its most disciplined expression; a carpet of this fineness demands that the motif be rendered accurately several thousand times over without drift. The knot count is high enough that the drawing holds its definition at arm's length, and the silk highlights lift the lattice wherever the light falls. Design pattern: Mahi herati-fish allover with central medallion, Tabriz. Size: 8'3" x 11'3". Gallery Collection.