h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Stylized deer, wolves, and maybe even kitties, embedded (or not) in star-shaped forms. Was this a tapestry? Did it decorate a wall or a floor or a bed? Anyone who could have told us for sure has been dead for 700 years or more.

In much of this period, animals could be used as symbols (example: dogs as marital fidelity). Nowadays, deer mean ruin for the hostas in your garden. Wolves are unlikely to enter your yard, and coyotes would mean you're putting too much food waste in your trash.

Ahem. Let's not sell museum curators short: they're not dead, and they can tell us a bit about what's in their inventory.

http://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/448196?&searchField=All&sortBy=Relevance&ft=14th+century+tile&offset=20&rpp=20&pos=33

From the Met's catalogue describing this star-shaped tile from 14th-century Iran:

'This eight-pointed star tile was once part of a panel of star- and cross-shaped tiles adorning the walls of an Ilkhanid building. In its center, a spotted gazelle stands in a field of vegetation, possibly in reference to the motif of the jairan (deer gazing at the moon) that originated in Chinese Buddhist art. Two verses of Persian poetry painted in luster run along the border.'

Alas, I cannot read Persian - I only had a dozen lessons, and all I can say in Farsi is 'I have a passport' - so maybe somebody else can come along and identify the poetry for us.

All I have found out about deer and the moon is that deer movements are affected by lunar phases, and hunters know this.

Thanks for giving us some context, Dmitri.

My linguistic abilities have more to do with pronunciation than translation. As Lorenz Hart once wrote in one of his lyrics, "One man's Mede is another man's Persian."

(And thank you for giving me the right set-up for that pun. I rarely get a chance to showcase it. )