Gifts to the Tsars 1500-1700: Treasures from the Kremlin by Barry s> Shifman Guy Walton (review)

Abstract

REVIEWS I 33 in the frameworkof the shiftfromliberaleconomic policy to the emergence of eatism in Poland. Taguchi concludes that there was no ideological basis for etatism but ratherthe instabilityof the Polish economy in the difficultworld situation made it inevitable. Katsuyoshi Watanabe examines the military manoeuvres attending the Warsaw uprising in I944, mainly using Soviet sources, and comes to the conclusion that the AK's decision was premature and the Soviet standon this issue understandable.The workbyJun Yoshioka focuseson the use of nationalismwithin the frameworkof communistregime's search for legitimacy and its role in constructing an ethnically homogenous state through anti-German rhetoric and actions against the Ukrainian minority. Makoto Hayasaka's contribution again centres on a minority, Russian Old Believers in Lithuania. Hayasaka interviews members of the existing Old Believer settlements and establishes that they are enjoying a culturalrevival yet at the same time assimilatingthemselves into Lithuanian society. The last piece by Matsukawais polemical in nature and sketchesthe history of modern Poland through the concepts of 'honour' and 'fatherland' drawingexamplesfromthe Polishstateafterthe FirstWorldWar,the meeting of Beck and Hitler, and Poland's future within NATO. Matsukawa'smain argument is that it is essential for Polish intereststhat Russia be barredfrom joining NATO and the EU and a rapprochement between Russia and Germany mustbe prevented. English summaries found in the back of the book (pp. xviii-xxxi) offer anglophone readersthe opportunityto observe the recent scholarlydevelopments inJapan. Properreferencesare given by the respectiveauthorsand the use of visual materialsis quite effective.The index (pp. v-xv) is generous and shortbiographiesof the authorsappended at the backprovide a usefulsource for furtherreading. Thus, as was the intention of the editors, this volume has the potential to influence historiansoutside an immediate circle of specialists. There are, however, a couple of reservations.There are differenttransliterations and translationsof key terms such as Rzeczpospolita (two transliterations and threetranslations!)and szlachta thatareconfusingto those unfamiliarwith Polish history. It may be added that, in so far as such terms remain unexplainedin a numberof texts,a glossarywould have been helpful.Another desideratum is a collection of maps showing the internal and external boundaries of Poland(-Lithuania)over the centuries since many referencesto places are made without exact description of where they are. In the final analysis, this book represents an exciting advance not only because of the wide-rangingthemes and methodologies that are employed but alsofortaking the boundariesof Polishhistoryfurther. King'sCollege London M. WASA Shifman, Barryand Walton, Guy (eds). GiftstotheTsars1500-I700.- Treasures fromtheKremlin. HarryN. Abrams,New York,2001. 336 pp. Illustrations. Bibliography.Index. Notes. $65.00. THIS sumptuous catalogue was compiled to accompany an eponymous exhibition held at the Indianapolis Museum of Arts in September 2001 to I34 SEER, 8i, I, 2003 January 2002. Introductory articles on the historical background, foreign relations and diplomacy, ambassadorialceremonies and receptions, and the conventions governing the selection, presentation and storage of gifts, all richlyillustrated,precede ninety-fivefullyillustratedand annotated catalogue entries(pp. 135-305), arrangedunderthe headings'The Courtof the Russian Tsar' (on objects made in Russia) and sections on gifts from the Christian East, the Ottoman Empire and Persia, Poland and Lithuania, Austria, England, the Dutch Republic, Sweden, Denmark, and Schleswig-Holstein. The book ends with biographiesof relevanttsars,patriarchsand donors. Although the texts are scholarly and informative, the chief attraction of GiftstotheTsarsare the finely reproduced, mainly full-colourimages, starting opposite the title page with a notional portrait (ca. I672) of Tsar Aleksei Mikhailovich,carryingthe royalregaliaand dressedin a brocade and damask ceremonial caftanwith ajewelled and pearl-sowncollar.The context in which the royal presence was displayed is later vividly evoked by manuscript miniaturesfrom 'The Book on the Election to the Most High Throne of the Great Russian Realm of the Great Sovereign, Tsar and Great PrinceMikhail Fedorovich' of I672-I673. In conjunction with James Billington's opening essay on the projection and celebration of autocratic power, which dwells somewhat excessively on Muscovite megalomania, paranoia and xenophobia, these and other images evoke Oriental otherness, thereby probably confirming the preconceptions of visitors to the exhibition. From the visual evidence presented here it is easy to understand why participants at Muscovite receptions were literally dazzled. Even quite modest items drip with gems for example, an icon cover adorned with turquoise, sapphires (highly prized, apparently), pearls and...