On the Muscovite Gifts to the Austrian Habsburgs in the Late 16th Century

As 16th-century Muscovy started returning to European policy using military expansion, diplomacy and propaganda, the question of renewing its communications with the Holy Roman Empire, the leading continental power, swiftly arose. To that end the tsars used every possible tool, including gifts to the emperors and their diplomats. However, Russian presents, gift-giving practices and rituals were strikingly different from those of their imperial counterparts, which offered new diplomatic possibilities to both tsars and emperors, although sometimes that difference impeded their communications, self-representation and foreign policy. This article sheds light on what gifts the Russians gave to the Austrian Habsburgs and their emissaries, how they were given, received and understood, how well they worked as diplomatic, cultural and self-representation tools and what they can tell us about the mutual images of the Russian and imperial elites.