A little-known Dutch collection of Indian chintzes, newly acquired by the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Mass., is revealing centuries of changing habits in fabric exporting, collecting and tailoring.
The museum paid an undisclosed price for about 170 textiles, including bedspreads, caps, jackets and robes, dating to the early 1700s. The designs combine European folk patterns and botanical motifs typical of Mughal landscape paintings.
