Gift of State: Diplomacy and Dutch Material Culture in the Ottoman Empire in the Early Seventeenth Century

FAIN: FT-59089-11

Claudia Swan
Washington University (Evanston, IL 60208-0001)

The aim of this project is to render an account, by way of historical and archival research in the Netherlands and in Turkey, of the first diplomatic gift presented by the Netherlands to the Ottoman court, and to offer an analysis of this gift in the context of early modern material culture, gift exchange, and conceptions of exoticism. The research I propose to conduct in summer 2011 is central to a key chapter of a book I am currently writing on Dutch collecting and material culture in the seventeenth century. Carrying out this research will enable me to complete the chapter that in turn will conclude the book manuscript tentatively titled "The Aesthetics of Possession: Art, Science, and Collecting in the Netherlands 1600-1650."

Associated Products

Exotica on the Move: Birds of Paradise in Early Modern Holland (Article)
Title: Exotica on the Move: Birds of Paradise in Early Modern Holland
Author: Claudia Swan
Abstract: Exploring the interpretive potential of a study of exotica as objects on the move, this essay analyses a paradigmatic instance of the copious exotic objects that the Dutch mobilized in the seventeenth century – birds of paradise. Native to Papua New Guinea, these birds were prized throughout Europe for their stunning plumage, rarity, and distant origins. By reconstructing trade and interest in birds of paradise in the Netherlands, this essay describes how these exotic wares were described and evaluated; how they were valued on and off the market; and how the awe that they inspired served political purposes. In early modern Holland, the exotic depended for its value on the coordinates of the market, and also exercised a power beyond market control, entwined with the political aims of the emergent Republic. In ways that this essay delineates, birds of paradise exemplify early modern Dutch exoticism.
Year: 2015
Primary URL: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/ahis.2015.38.issue-4/issuetoc
Secondary URL: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1467-8365.12171/abstract
Format: Journal
Periodical Title: Art History
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Birds of Paradise for the Sultan: Early Seventeenth-Century Dutch-Turkish Encounters and the Uses of Wonder (Article)
Title: Birds of Paradise for the Sultan: Early Seventeenth-Century Dutch-Turkish Encounters and the Uses of Wonder
Author: Claudia Swan
Abstract: This article describes and analyzes the first diplomatic gift presented by the States General of the Netherlands to the Ottoman Sultan Ahmet i in 1612/1613. The extensive and very costly assortment of items was presented to the Sultan in gratitude for capitulations,permitting the Dutch access to Ottoman ports and therefore direct access to trade in the Levant and Mediterranean.This paper describes the diplomatic gift, a long-neglected episode in Dutch material cultural history, and looks in particular at the role that wonder and wonders played in structuring this remarkable encounter between the fledgling Dutch Republic and the Ottoman court.
Year: 2013
Primary URL: https://www.de-zeventiende-eeuw.nl/articles/10.18352/dze.8464/
Secondary URL: https://doaj.org/article/4893dbbf1239469da8bee1e49a57563c
Access Model: Open Access
Format: Journal
Periodical Title: De zeventiende eeuw
Publisher: Utrecht University Library

Rarities of These Lands. Art, Trade, and Diplomacy in the Dutch Republic (Book)
Title: Rarities of These Lands. Art, Trade, and Diplomacy in the Dutch Republic
Author: Claudia Swan
Abstract: The seventeenth century witnessed a great flourishing of Dutch trade and culture. Over the course of the first half of the century, the northern Netherlands secured independence from the Spanish crown, and the nascent republic sought to establish its might in global trade, often by way of diplomatic relations with the Ottoman Empire and other Muslim powers. Central to the political and cultural identity of the Dutch Republic were curious foreign goods the Dutch called “rarities.” Rarities of These Lands explores how these rarities were obtained, exchanged, stolen, valued, and collected, tracing their global trajectories and considering their role within the politics of the new state. Claudia Swan’s insightful, engaging analysis offers a novel and compelling account of how the Dutch Republic turned foreign objects into expressions of its national self-conception.
Year: 2021
Primary URL: https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691207964/rarities-of-these-lands
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Type: Single author monograph
ISBN: 978-0-691-2079
Copy sent to NEH?: No

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