BOSTON — For more than 40 years, Ralph and Linda Kaffel worked tirelessly to create one of the finest rug collections ever known, impeccable in quality and historical import, and fully documented with pages of notes for each, all hand-written by Ralph. With his passing in 2023, the collection was consigned to Grogan & Co., and 241 lots made their way back to the market on January 21. Complete results are available at LiveAuctioneers.

Thanks to Ralph’s meticulous documentation, bidders had access to each rug’s full known history, both in terms of origin as well as provenance. The sale’s top lot was an 18th-century Azerbaijan rug formerly of the Joseph Ritman collection. Measuring 5ft 10in by 4ft 9 in, the rug belongs to a group of carpets from eastern Anatolia, western Caucasia, and northern Persia, with a dominant medallion and pendant palmettes. Estimated at $30,000-$50,000, it hammered for $70,000 and sold for $93,100 with buyer’s premium.

A Central Asian salor trapping woven some time before 1800 followed closely, hammering for $65,000 ($86,450 with buyer’s premium). As noted in the catalog, “Small Salor decorative hangings with kejebe motifs and only one central medallion are much rarer than the large examples with two or three medallions.”

It was common to create woven tent-door surrounds for nomadic lifestyles. Called kapunuks, they come in a variety of sizes. This Central Asian tekke kapunuk dates to pre-1800 and is slightly smaller than other documented examples. Estimated at $15,000-$25,000, it hammered for $52,500 ($69,825 with buyer’s premium).

Aksaray is a central Anatolian town that was was a center for pile carpet-making during the Seljuk period. This pre-1800 rug features a dotted white ground thought to depict animal skin, while the geometric shapes are believed to represent splayed animal pelts. It sold for $47,500 ($63,175 with buyer’s premium), well ahead of its $10,000-$20,000 presale estimate.