A study on the gift log, MAD 1279: making sense of gift-giving in the eighteenth century Ottoman society

Abstract

The study of gifts, a classical theme of research in economic anthropology, involve, in broad lines, a study of the respective constitution of objects and subjects in exchange. Through gift-giving, the officialization of social relations, the reproduction of status boundaries and social cohesion, and the negotiation of social values is achieved. As such, the communicative, reproductive, and constitutive aspects of gift-giving plays on the relations of power endemic into society. In order to test the received opinions on gift-giving, a research on the gift logs, and various other archival material that keep the records of gift-giving, is undertaken in a period, in our case designated as eighteenth century Ottoman society. In addition to the general comments on the archival material, a particular gift log is chosen for the tabulation of the features of objects, subjects and the geographical locations, over time. In conclusion, I suggest that gift-giving in eighteenth century Ottoman society could be regarded, specifically, as a form of payment, akin to other forms of transfer, e.g. charity, reimbursement, or taxation. Bestowed not only by private persons but also by, or at least in the name of, groups and communities, the gifts act as delineative of social boundaries and render communication across them, without compromising those distinctions. In this sense, they could be thought of as access / communication fees in a medium where various agents act as brokers of patronage and agents of government for an early modern bureaucracy.