Amarna Letters: A Brief Summary And Analysis

Marcel Mauss (2002) in his seminal work The Gift (2002) has said that even though gift-giving is technically a voluntary process and it is allegedly free of any egotism in reality gift giving and receiving is a social obligation and is inundated with self-interest. Mauss adds that the gestures associated with gift-giving, the mask of generosity and disinterestedness, are all mere fictions to appease our sense of propriety. In other words, when people give gifts they do so with the motive of receiving something in return. This exchange of gifts creates a bond of social and oftentimes economic obligation between people. If we hold Mauss’ ideas to hold true for the archaic societies he was speaking of, then we must acknowledge that the same must be true for the people living in the Middle East and Mediterranean in the 2nd and 1st Millennium BCE. Gift-giving has helped create and perpetuate social and economic relationship between people throughout the ages and the same is true for those who lived during the 2nd and 1st Millennium BCE. …show more content…
The Amarna letters (Campbell 1960) date roughly around the mid-fourteenth century B.C. and the Uluburun shipwreck (Fawcett and Zietsman 2012) dates from around 1300 BC. The timeline of the two are close enough to warrant some discussion on their possible linkages. Any such existing linkages may bring clarity in our understanding of the importance of gift exchanges in the Middle East and Mediterranean in the 2nd and 1st Millennium BCE.
The Amarna letters can be considered as historical evidence when it comes to understanding the importance of gift exchange in the Late Bronze Age