Occasionally, the carpet might be moved toward one 

 side of the room if the social activities of the day 

 included dancing or some similar frolic (fig. 5). 

 Or the carpet might be removed completely. During 

 a visit to Baltimore in 1785, a young Englishman, 

 Robert Hunter, reported of one social gathering he 

 attended: "After tea the carpet was taken up, and 

 we danced away to some charming music till eleven 

 o'clock . . . [when] we retired to supper, and went 

 home in our wagon at twelve."'^ 



The paintings also reveal that Turkey carpets were 

 used in the principal rooms of the house where they 

 provided a background of color and comfort against 

 which activities such as tea drinking, card playing, 

 and conversation were enjoyed by polite society in 

 the 18th century. The household inventories already 

 mentioned provide further proof that Turkey carpets 

 were usually to be found in the principal rooms. In 

 the Jackson household, the Turkey carpets were 

 located in the "Front Room" and in the Winslow 

 residence in the "Front Chamber" upstairs as well as 

 downstairs, while Aaron Burr had covered the floor of 

 his drawing room with "1 Elegant Turkey Carpet cS: 

 2 recess pieces." Furthermore, the Franklins had 

 obtained a Turkey carpet for their dining parlor. 

 The description of the Boston house of Mr. Boylston 

 that appears in the diary of a rising New England 

 lawyer, John Adams, reveals how elegant the settings 

 could be in which Oriental carpets were to be found 

 in 18th-century America. It also indicates that car- 

 pet owners were proud of their possessions and had 

 taste as well as wealth and social status. Of his 

 visit to Mr. Boylston's Boston house on January 16, 

 1766, the future President of the United States wrote: 



Dined at Mr. Nick Boylstones, with the two Mr. Boyl- 

 stones, two Mr. Smiths, Mr. Hallowe! and the Ladies. 

 An elegant Dinner indeed ! Went over the House to 

 view the Furniture, which alone cost a thousand Pounds 

 sterling. A Seat it is for a noble Man, a Prince. The 

 Turkey Carpets, the painted Hangings, the Marble 

 Tables, the rich Beds with crimson Damask Curtains 

 and Counterpins, the beautiful Chimny Clock, the 

 Spacious Garden, are the most magnificent of any Thing 

 I have ever seen.-" 



Oriental carpets, which at the beginning of the 18th 

 century were customarily spread on tables and other 

 pieces of furniture, had by the second half of the 

 century become established as an underfoot furnishing. 



FLOORCLOTH 



Floorcloths were simply canvas or some other 

 sturdy cloth material covered with several coats of 

 paint for durability. When the smooth hard surface 

 was ornamented with a design, as often was the case, 

 a floorcloth was as decorative as any carpet. 



In colonial houses floorcloths were used as floor 

 coverings somewhat earlier than Oriental carpets. In 

 the early fSth century when Turkey carpets were 

 being laid on the tops of tables, floorcloths already 

 were being spread underneath. When William Bur- 

 net, governor first of New York and New Jersey and 

 then of Massachusetts, died in 1729, he is reported to 

 have had "two old checquered canvases to lay under 

 a table" and "a large painted canvas square as the 

 room." -' This was the same year Smibert painted 

 Bishop Berkeley and his entourage grouped about a 

 table covered with a Turkey carpet (fig. 10). Floor- 

 cloths also were used in the South at about the same 

 date by the wealthy Virginia landowner Robert 

 "King" Carter of "Corotoman." "1 large Floor oyl" 

 was listed among the contents of the "Dining Room 

 Clossett" in the "Old house" and "1 large oyle cloth 

 to lay under a Table" was listed among the contents 

 of the "Brick House Loft" in the inventory of Carter's 

 home plantation in Lancaster County taken after his 

 death in 1 732.-- Painted canvas and oilcloth were but 

 two of the many synonyms for a floorcloth, variously 

 referred to as canvas carpets, canvas floorcloths, 

 fancy pattern cloths for the floor, oil floorcloths, 

 painted floorcloths, painted-duck floorcloths, painted 

 carpets, and painted canvas. 



Floorcloths were both imported and made in this 

 country. "Painted floor cloths" were among the 

 items "Just Imported" offered for sale in the I'irginia 

 Gazette of July 25, 1 766. And they continued to be 

 imported. Sorne 33 years later an advertisement in 



i» Quebec to Carolina in 1785-1786, Being the Travel Diary and 

 Observations of Robert Hunter, Jr., a Young Merchant of London, 

 edit. Louis B. Wright and Marion Tinling (San Marino, 

 Calif.: The Huntington Library, 1943), p. 185. 



-" Diary of John Adams. In The Adams Papers, edit. L. H. 

 Butterfield (Cambridge, Mass.: The Belknap Press, 1961), 

 vol. 1, p. 294. 



-' R. T. H. Halsev and Charles O. Cornelius, .4 Handbook 

 of the American Wing (New York: The Metropolitan Museum 

 of Art, 1924), p. 132. 



'^ An Inventory of all the S and personal property of the 



Hon'ble Robert Carter of the county Lancaster Esq.. Deceased, 

 taken as directed in his last will. In "Carter Papers." The 

 Virginia Magazine of History and Biography (October 1898 and 

 January 1899), vol. 6, pp. 145 and 262. 



10 



BULLETIN 250 : CONTRIBUTIONS FROM THE MUSEUM OF HISTORY AND TECHNOLOGY 



