Dr Tracey A. Sowerby: List of publications

European ambassadors to the Ottoman court believed that it was impossible to conduct diplomacy there without giving lavish gifts. They were right to point to a diplomatic culture in which gift giving played a central role, for the Ottoman sultans structured much of their diplomatic protocol and understood their relations with other princes to a significant degree through the gifts they received and gave. Indeed, in the case of Ottoman contact with polities such as Fez and Persia, the exchange of gifts between rulers ensured ongoing, if sometimes irregular, diplomatic relations. Previous studies of diplomatic gifts at the Ottoman court have tended to focus on the ‘magnificence’ of the gift, the processes of gift-giving, or aspects of gift-giving that scholars see as different from the European system of gift-giving, such as tribute and khilat. This essay goes beyond these approaches by examining the performativity surrounding gift exchanges and the language of material objects gifted during diplomatic encounters at the Ottoman court. Drawing upon extant gift registers from the rule of Bayezid II and Süleyman, as well as a range of other Ottoman, Persian, and European sources, this essay examines how the celebrations surrounding diplomatic gifts formed a key part of Ottoman diplomatic culture and the ways in which such festivities reflected the status accorded to the donor (and his diplomat(s)) by the sultans. Performance—whether artistic, musical, poetical, or relating to animal handling—could itself be a gift or part of a gift bundle. Meanwhile the festivities that coincided with gift exchange can be understood within the framework of the gifting process. The essay also considers diplomatic gift exchanges as part of a complex interplay between gifting conventions, understandings of material culture, and ceremonial practices. While many of the gifts sent to the sultans were formulaic, some were unique items that through their very fabric conveyed distinct material messages that nuanced whatever message was conveyed by the diplomat conveying the present. Some were designed to reinforce the amicable relations between the two rulers, others sought to participate in the ongoing struggle for relative status between the princes, others asserted religious values across confessional boundaries, and yet others conveyed warnings of what might come to pass should the amity between the princes be broken.

Non-regnant queens played an integral role in maintaining amicable relations between rulers in the early modern period. This article focuses on one specific means by which dowagers and consorts shaped international relations: the diplomatic gift exchanges in which they participated. Foreign rulers recognised non-regnant queens as a source of influence and power at court; unsurprisingly they adopted gifting strategies designed to persuade the queens to support their proposals. Gift-giving within English diplomacy is used as a locus for exploring English attitudes and practice towards queens consort and dowager, as well as the practices adopted by both English and foreign non-regnant queens in order to assert their place within diplomatic relations. As diplomatic practices were largely based on notions of reciprocity (with gradations to take account of status if necessary), the prism of English relations offers insights into international practice more broadly. The liminal position that queen consorts and dowager held within the international honour society potentially lent them greater diplomatic flexibility than their husbands and sons. This made them both a potential asset and a potential threat to the effective implementation of their husband’s diplomacy. The patterns of gifting of which English queens consort were a part paralleled, complemented, and complicated the diplomatic relationships that their husbands sought to forge. When faced with unprecedented diplomatic situations, queen consorts could often engage in gifting relations with less risk than their sovereign husbands. Furthermore, this flexibility created opportunities for consorts to become more influential in shaping the direction of policy. More broadly, non-regnant queens could use their parallel, if inferior position, to make their own position on key foreign policy issues clear. They might even, on occasion, attempt to reshape their husband’s foreign policy through their own gifting strategies.

Elizabeth I may not have been England’s first queen regnant, but it was in her reign that the full implications of female monarchy were felt in English diplomacy. The theoretical justification of English ambassadors had often rested on the political closeness of the ambassador to the monarch, yet an unmarried queen surrounded by rumours of a lack of chastity—her own and her mother’s—had to be careful about just how intimate she appeared to be to her male courtiers and counsellors. This essay examines gendered notions and chivalry within Elizabethan diplomatic practices. First it analyses the utility of chivalric discourses during the reign of a queen and the ways in which Elizabeth’s ambassadors used chivalry as a means of reconciling their ambassadorial character—that is their position as the proxy of their queen—with Elizabeth’s gender. Chivalric tropes offered a way of expressing their political intimacy with the queen in a way that did not suggest any sexual impropriety (an important consideration given Catholic propaganda against Elizabeth). Secondly, it focusses on the relationship between chivalry and service in the embassies of Sir Henry Unton to the martial court of Henry IV of France. After examining chivalric language in Unton’s correspondence, the essay turns to consider the highly irregular actions of Unton in challenging the Duke of Guise to a duel. In doing so, it interrogates how chivalry further problematized the already complicated relationship between the personal and official personas of the ambassador.

Focussing on international affairs, this essay tackles one area of government that Winthrop Hudson did not—international affairs—and demonstrates that the ‘Cambridge Conection’ dominated the early Elizabethan diplomatic corps. A large number of Cheke’s circle in the 1530s and 1540s, many Cambridge educated, were central to Elizabeth’s early international efforts, including Roger Ascham, William Cecil, Thomas Chaloner, Henry Killigrew, John Mason, Thomas Smith, and Thomas Wilson. These men worked together as diplomats and secretaries. One of the things that bound them in their political endeavours was a shared sense of scholarship. Many wrote original texts that reflected on the nature of the state or contemporary politics, which they shared with other members of the affinity. They traded histories, political treatises, works of philosophy, and religious tracts. Underlying many of these scholarly links was, however, a practical concern with protecting England’s religion and international position. Hence the group also collaborated over the composition of tracts defending the Elizabethan regime to foreign audiences and the translation of English works into foreign languages for overseas consumption and foreign works for English audiences. The intellectual bonds forged in the 1530s and 1540s, then, continued to bind them together and proved instrumental to the operating of the early Elizabethan diplomatic corps.

The Introduction outlines the inter-penetration of literary and diplomatic cultures within European and some non-European diplomatic practices, emphasizing the wide-ranging and sophisticated ways in which early modern diplomats utilized literary motifs. It introduces readers to existing research within the emerging field of diplo-literary studies and those areas of the ‘new diplomatic history’ which are most pertinent to the core thematic focus of the collection. While situating contributions within this literature, it also outlines the collective methodological and theoretical import of the volume. Paying particular attention to literary representations of diplomacy, diplomacy and translation, the diplomatic dissemination of texts, and the texts used in diplomatic practice, it draws out a series of findings for the field

Royal letters were an integral part of early modern diplomatic communication, intended to shape inter-princely relationships through their content and their material form. The exchange of letters was a communicative mechanism on multiple, not simply textual, levels. Utilising an interdisciplinary methodology and focusing on letters sent to and from English monarchs in the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, this chapter demonstrates the dynamic interactions between material text and the diplomatic conventions—ceremonial, material, visual, spatial—in which they need to be understood. Knowledge of the ceremonial context into which letters were sent shaped the considerations of how they looked and how they travelled. Although the predominant form of inter-princely letter exchanged within Europe was different from the predominant form of letters between European and non-European rulers, several of the same factors were at play. Rather than indicating a lack of cultural understanding between English diplomats and non-European princes, the epistolary practice of Elizabeth I and James VI/I suggests that many of the semiotics of power at extra-European courts were adeptly recognised by English diplomats.

Contribution to Gordon Martel (ed.) The Encyclopedia of Diplomacy

© 2017 selection and editorial matter, Tracey A. Sowerby and Jan Hennings. Practices of Diplomacy in the Early Modern World offers a new contribution to the ongoing reassessment of early modern international relations and diplomatic history. Divided into three parts, it provides an examination of diplomatic culture from the Renaissance into the eighteenth century and presents the development of diplomatic practices as more complex, multifarious and globally interconnected than the traditional state-focussed, national paradigm allows. The volume addresses three central and intertwined themes within early modern diplomacy: who and what could claim diplomatic agency and in what circumstances; the social and cultural contexts in which diplomacy was practised; and the role of material culture in diplomatic exchange. Together the chapters provide a broad geographical and chronological presentation of the development of diplomatic practices and, through a strong focus on the processes and significance of cultural exchanges between polities, demonstrate how it was possible for diplomats to negotiate the cultural codes of the courts to which they were sent. This exciting collection brings together new and established scholars of diplomacy from different academic traditions. It will be essential reading for all students of diplomatic history.

This essay explores the ways in which Tudor monarchs utilised the spatial and material elements of their palaces to create a complex and nuanced diplomatic vocabulary. Different areas within the palace were invested with specific ceremonial meanings as the symbolic use of space within Tudor palaces was used to express authority and domestic and international political hierarchies. While the significance of a space was predominantly determined by its function, this could be modified by its decoration, as the display of paintings or tapestries was used to bolster legitimacy, express ideas of monarchy and signal former and current alliances. By exploiting the ceremonial significance of palatial spaces, particularly the distinctions between the ostensibly public and private areas and varying the sites of diplomatic rituals, monarchs created political intimacies or distances between themselves and foreign ambassadors and, by extension, the rulers they represented. A diplomatic audience in the monarch’s bedroom or alone in a private area of the royal gardens was held to be of great significance regardless of any tangible political benefits. Equally, monarchs’ and diplomats’ interactions with the visual culture of the court offered a convenient means to articulate the subtleties within diplomatic relationships in a less formal and more intimate manner that was conveniently less accountable than purely verbal or written modes of communication.

Portraits of rulers, medals, and other images of politicians were widely used within early modern diplomatic practice. Historians have long appreciated the role of portrait exchange in early modern royal marriage negotiations. Far less appreciated are the prevalence of portrait exchanges between European monarchs outside of marriage negotiations and the diplomatic uses made of these, and other, royal portraits. Diplomatic art operated within a ceremonial and symbolic system where even small distinctions were imbued with considerable significance and where reciprocity, honour, prestige, magnificence, friendship, and concepts of gift-giving were crucial components in constructing its diplomatic meaning. Rulers’ images played an important role in diplomatic strategy; their display advertised current and past political alliances and suggested the direction of future policy, while portrait gifts and personal interactions with portraits during diplomatic audiences created political intimacies, established confidences, and helped to maintain relations in strained circumstances.

This essay provides a detailed analysis of the pageants that Nicholas Udall (and others) wrote for the coronation of Henry's controversial second wife, Anne Boleyn, focussing in particular on the dynastic and religious rhetoric of the coronation performances.

This chapter explores works printed in 1535, contextualising their content and reception against Henry VIII's recently introduced Royal Supremacy, 1534 Treason Law and the 1534 Act for Printers and Binders of Books. It discusses print produced by the government to persuade the commons of the king's policies and the discussions that surrounded them, as well as works concerned with religious controversies.

<a href=""></a>

In the first two decades of Henry VIII's reign, his government deliberately promoted the publication of polemics on the continent. These were principally designed to celebrate his military victories and foreign policy. During the crucial years of the Divorce and Royal Supremacy, this policy was extended. Precisely those Henrician polemics which justified the Divorce and laid the foundations of the Supremacy became source books for English diplomats. Tracts such as Stephen Gardiner's De vera obedientia were concurrently sent to English diplomats at foreign courts, presented to foreign courtiers and sometimes published by continental printers. Thus uniformity in English rhetoric at home and abroad was ensured at the very time when the theory of the Henrician church was being developed and faced its strongest criticisms. In practical terms the use of polemical works as diplomatic handbooks also made sense, providing ready-made justifications and potentially saving precious time when composing diplomatic instructions. Throughout the 1530s and 1540s there was also a strong concern that official tracts be sufficiently robust to stand up to public scrutiny. The men involved in the propaganda campaigns recognised too that the importance of a work of government polemic lay not just in its arguments, but also (and often more importantly) in the use to which it was put. The sophistication of both the polemical campaigns and Henrician diplomacy was, therefore, greater than has previously been appreciated.