Embroidering history: the V&A should take a pluralistic approach in the Middle East | Letter

Michal Friedlander and Abigail Green are concerned that a current V&A Dundee exhibition erases the historic presence of Christians and Jews in the region

We were interested to see your gallery of pictures from the exhibition Thread Memory: Embroidery from Palestine at V&A Dundee (‘A symbol of Palestinian presence and identity’: the personal and political world of ‘tatreez’ – in pictures, 18 August), having visited the partner exhibit at V&A South Kensington.

The tatreez embroidery tradition should indeed be celebrated, but as scholars we are concerned by the failure to use historically correct language, and to recognise the diversity of cultures that existed in the area presented here simply as “Palestine”. Formally speaking, there was no such place in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, when several of these objects were produced.