European Diplomatic Gifts, Sixteenth-Eighteenth Centuries: Guest Editor's Introduction (original) (raw)
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Portable Dynasties: Imperial Gift-Giving at the Court of Vienna in the Eighteenth Century
The Court Historian, 2009
This essay explores the varied meanings attached to imperial diplomatic gifts in eighteenth-century Habsburg court culture, particularly during the reign of Empress Maria Theresa. It examines the role of gifts in solidifying political allegiances and the different ways that social relationships were implied through giving different objects, ranging from a medieval hunting horn to furniture and snuff-boxes. The essay also discusses the ceremonial process of gift-giving in Vienna and the manner in which court protocol affected a gift's meanings. The influence of Habsburg dynastic and familial ideology on gift culture receives special emphasis in an extended discussion of one particularly impressive portrait-encrusted snuff-box.
‘Furnished with gentlemen’: the ambassador's house in sixteenth-century Italy
Renaissance Studies, 2009
The importance of hospitality in sixteenth-century diplomacy is summed up in a comment from Nicholas Hawkins, English resident ambassador to the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V from 1532 to 1534. 1 While in Bologna for a meeting between Charles and Pope Clement VII, Hawkins became concerned that he was unable to match the standard set by others in the diplomatic corps when it came to entertaining. He wrote to Henry VIII's chief minister Thomas Cromwell:r est_618 518..535 Treuth it is, that the cnowledge of suche thingis whiche I shuld certifi the King on, for the most parte I must gett it of thother Imbassatours; and therfor must bothe invite them, and be invitid. 2 Here, Hawkins highlights the role of sociability in gathering information, but the provision of lavish hospitality would also reflect positively on the honour of the ambassador's prince. At this early stage of resident diplomacy, the ambassador's house was in an important sense his place of work. He would, of course, attend the court to which he was sent; however there were no designated embassy buildings. Whether a resident diplomat providing general reports on the political situation, or someone sent to carry out a specific task negotiating, say, a marriage or a peace treaty, the ambassador prepared his strategies and wrote his letters at home and, importantly, he entertained there.
A B S T R A C T. This article explains how the concept and the practice of gift-making evolved in Spanish Italy in connection with power. Contemporary chronicles, avvisi (newsletters), and letters enable us to reflect upon how gifts were seen, given, and received in the period at the Spanish embassy in Rome and in the viceroyalty of Naples. It aims to establish how the exchange of presents affected the wielding of power and how it contributed to shaping the political culture of the Spanish in Italy. The seventeenth century and Italy were the time and place that witnessed the greatest experimentation in gift-making practices. This experimentation and the polysemic nature of gifts can also be explained as a result of the low level of professionalization that still characterized diplomacy in seventeenth-century Europe.
2023
The use of works of art as diplomatic gifts or in the construction of the scenography of power during the Early Modern period has been widely discussed in recent decades. However, we have less information on the methods of acquisition and transportation of works of art between European courts before they fulfilled this ritual and political function. This paper will explore these topics by analyzing the correspondence of royal secretaries and Spanish ambassadors, who worked interchangeably for the courts of Spain and Vienna. The letters preserved in Austrian and Spanish archives make it possible to document the sending of books, sculptures, paintings, and even architectural models. The royal secretaries and ambassadors thus became first-rate cultural liaisons in forging the Habsburg dynasty's image of power.
Legatio, 2020
Grand viziers acted as the utmost important figure in the Ottoman bureaucratic administration throughout the early modern era. Conducting relations with foreign countries and, hence, conforming to the rules of an established diplomatic practice in the process were among their duties. The present study, therefore, aims at highlighting the underrated procedure of grand vizierial audiences through selected cases from the first half of the seventeenth century. In this respect, dispatches and final reports of certain representatives of major European monarchs in Istanbul are brought to light along with complementary data from Ottoman fiscal records of the time. The reception of foreign diplomats by the grand vizier – which presents its own intricacies and follows its own set of rules – is hence laid under scrutiny to understand how a physical language of diplomacy was created. Accordingly, welcoming receptions by the grand viziers will be studied instead of focusing on the negotiation audiences between the grand viziers and the incoming embassies. Comparisons with the imperial audiences will also be useful both in underlining the differentiation of this physical language from the one employed in the audiences with the sultan and also in evaluating the diplomatic function of the grand vizier within the framework of Ottoman foreign relations. In this respect, the first receptions by the grand vizier were intended to welcome foreign embassies and played a crucial part in their diplomatic mission since the date for the sultanic audience was arranged herein. Moreover, exchange of gifts between the grand vizier and the emissaries, serving of refreshments and avoidance of any politically consequential issue during the meeting were the main elements of the grand vizierial receptions.
Gift Exchange at the Court of Cosimo I de' Medici, 1537-1574
2015
Objects are there to be used. Throughout history, the gifting of objects has been a universal activity. Anthropologists, sociologists, economists, philosophers, and historians (amongst others) have all grappled to define the role that gift-giving has played in diverse human societies. The act of gifting immediately modifies the value of an object, transfiguring it into a 'gift'. Once defined as a gift, both the object and its presentation contain particular meanings which resonate within the context of its exchange: the gift both communicates a message and a bond between sender and recipient. The resulting web of connections formed by gift exchanges are arguably the sinews of complex societies. The gift debits and credits, it obligates and liberates, it intimates and discriminates, not only between the one who gifts and the one who receives, but by those who view its exchange (who interpret the symbolism of a gift as indicative of a relationship or favour). In a society in w...
Diplomats and Patrons in the Early Modern World
2018
, 2010), for the most recent and largest collection of essays on the possessions and patronage of mainly Italian cardinals. See also the biographies of individual cardinals referenced in essays in this collection.
Bram van Leuveren, 'Print and Pageantry as Tools for Early Modern Public Diplomacy: French-Language Pamphlets on the Habsburg-Bourbon Weddings (1614-1615) and Marie de Médicis's Tour of the Low Countries (1638)', ed. Jan Bloemendal https://hdl.handle.net/1887/3637076.
Medievalia et Humanistica, 2023
This article seeks to examine seventeenth-century public diplomacy through the combined lens of print and pageantry. Both are rarely discussed alongside each other in contributions on early modern diplomacy, news media, and correspondence networks. It will be shown that ceremonial rituals and theatrical entertainments were nonetheless oft-discussed subjects in French-language pamphlets of the seventeenth century on diplomatic events, policies, and debates. This study argues that such events could constitute the focus of a pamphlet or surface as an important theme or reference point on the basis of which authors could build arguments, introduce or defend diplomatic agendas, or propose new solutions to a political conflict or dilemma. Pamphlets on the Habsburg-Bourbon marriages of 1614–1615, held at Marsh’s Library in Dublin within the collection of the English theologian and scholar Edward Stillingfleet (1635–1699), and the tour of Marie de Médicis (1575–1642), the exiled Queen Mother of France, across the Low Countries in 1638, kept in the Bibliotheca Thysiana of the Leiden University Library, will be discussed as tools for the public diplomacy of a wide range of transnational stakeholders.