Kohistan, meaning ‘land of mountains’, is a hardly accessible region at the mountainous north-east border of Pakistan — between the Swat Valley to the west and Kashmir to the north-east. It is populated by Pashtun and Dard tribes. Typical for Kohistan is the ‘Jumlo’, women’s wedding or festive dress. It is made of black cotton fabric with a richly decorated and embroidered bib. It has wide sleeves that also end in embroidery and decoration. The skirt part of the dress is constructed from numerous vertical pleats of black cotton. Sewn along its lower hem are many triangular pieces of fabric (‘gussets’) imparting a buoyant look to the ‘Jumlo’ when worn. The ‘Jumlo’ is worn with a scarf and trousers decorated both in a similar style. The present ‘Jumlo’ dress is unusually old, intact and has been worn a lot. The bib has very finely embroidered — in red, ochre and black — silk ram’s head and human figure motifs. Centrally placed is a solar-wheel amulet cast in brass and flanked by two triangular metal amulets with pendants. The frontal decorations are completed by Pakistani coins with soldered-on eyelets, as well as by rows of sewn nacre and plastic buttons. The bib’s side finish is achieved by small tassels of thread held together by aluminium rings. The somewhat more recent embroidery at the ends of the two wide sleeves is in red, black, yellow and green silk. All-round bands with zigzags and bird-head motifs are delimited by finishing rows of metal buttons (above the band) and aluminium rings (below the band). An inside pocket is sewn under the left sleeve. All in all, a very old textile piece with relatively minor age-related damage (small holes, impairments to the hem, the item requires cleaning). L: c. 94 cm. W: 160 cm (at the sleeves). First half of the 20th century.

Provenance: Italian Private Collection.