The Role of Diplomatic Gifts in Embassy Missions Organized During the Reign of Shah Abbas I Safavi

The article examines the gifts of diplomatic missions sent by the Safavids at the turn of the 16th and 17th centuries. Among them: the embassy of Shah Abbas, sent to Istanbul on the eve of the signing of the peace treaty of 1590 based on the chronicles of the Ottoman chronicler Ibrahim Rahmizadeh; an embassy organized to the Venetian Republic in 1603 based on materials from La Repubblica di Venezia e la Persia per Guglielmo Berchet; the embassy sent by Shah Abbas I almost simultaneously to the court of the Great Mughals based on the materials of the chronicle of Iskandar beg Turkoman Munshi Tarix-i Aləm-ara-yi Abbasi. Examining these gifts it becomes clear that these objects can also tell about the high level of art of particular people, about the demand for certain goods in certain regions, as well as about the nature and goals of a particular diplomatic mission. Indeed, in the Middle Ages, especially during the aggravation of relations between the Ottoman Empire and the Safavids or with Europe, the Safavid shahs were afraid to convey full information in an open letter. Therefore, more often than not, even the information preserved in diplomatic letters was transmitted in a rather vague form. In this regard, gifts were one of the important elements of the ambassadorial missions. Some of them were sometimes symbolic and, thus, carrying important information. The article also allotted a place to the ambassadors of the Safavid Shah, who headed these missions: Muhammad Khan Tukhmaq, Fethi beg, Yadegar beg.