Gift Exchanging Practices between the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies and the Ottoman Empire: ‘Cose Turche’ and Strange Animals

• D'Amora, Rosita ^[1]
  1. [1] University of Salento

     University of Salento

     Lecce, Italia

     
• Localización: Cromohs: Cyber Review of Modern Historiography, ISSN-e 1123-7023, Nº. 24, 2021 (Ejemplar dedicado a: Cromohs)
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • Between  August 1741 and the spring of 1743, following the conclusion of a treaty between the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies and the Porte, Naples became the stage of a series of attentively choreographed events starring two special guests:  Hacı Hüseyin Efendi, an envoy of the sultan Mahmud I and an elephant, presented as a sultan's gift to the King Charles of Bourbon. Both guests became a public spectacle, aroused great curiosity, and generated many written and visual responses. Resorting to both the Neapolitan court-sponsored  textual and visual reconstructions and to unpublished archival documents, this article shows how the both on- and off-stage performances arranged to present the envoy, and the sultan's gifts,  had the clear intent of leaving a long-lasting impression on the new Ottoman ally, but also  aimed to assert the power of the Bourbon king inspiring sentiments of wonder, admiration and devotion in his subjects.