Although many will go for wood or vinyl flooring in their living rooms, for many people the warmth and comfort of a carpet remains the preferred choice. But before calling in the carpet fitters, it is worth considering the many styles and rich history of carpets to gain some potential inspiration.

The world’s oldest known carpet is the Pazaryk Carpet, believed to date to around 500 BC. Thought to be Persian or Anatolian in origin, it was discovered in Siberia in 1949. Given its extensive and ornate patterns, we can safely assume it wasn’t the first carpet ever made and the tradition that it represented may have stretched back centuries before.

Over time, Middle Eastern carpet making traditions were picked up by the conquering Mongols, while another empire – the British – was to pick up on the styles and skills of the Indian subcontinent, bringing many styles and designs.

Another contender for the oldest carpet is the Berber style, with its familiar looped structure. Emerging from North Africa, the style has been seen in clothing dating from the Stone Age, although it is not clear whether it was then or later that it started being used for floor coverings. 

Moreover, while their floor mosaics might capture the imagination more, it is also notable that carpets were popular with the Greeks and Romans too.  

However, not all the most evocative or historically significant carpets belong to the ancient world; indeed, some owe their significance to other factors.

In 2009, staff cleaning out a storeroom of the Green Howard’s Regimental Museum in Richmond, North Yorkshire, found an envelope with a piece of carpet in and a letter, explaining that this had once belonged to a member of the regiment who had been in Adolf Hitler’s bunker in Berlin after the Nazi surrender in 1945. He had cut it out and taken it as a souvenir. 

That may not be the sort of thing you would want to inspire your home furnishings, but it was definitely a case of “Pile Hitler”!