Michael Laver is Department Chair and Associate Professor of History at the Rochester Institute of Technology, USA. He is the author of The Sakoku Edicts and the Politics of Tokugawa Hegemony (2011) and Japan’s Economy by Proxy in the Seventeenth Century (2008).

Laver’s strength is storytelling. He makes use of many detailed examples, culled almost exclusively from the seventeenth-century 'dagregisters', to engage the reader.

• List of IllustrationsIntroduction: The VOC and the Rhythm of Life in Early Modern Japan1. Gift Giving and the Early Modern Web of Diplomacy2. The Shogun’s Menagerie: Exotic Animals as Gifts3. Objet d’art: Most Exquisite Curiosities of Nature and Art4. Curios, Rarities and European Manufactured Goods5. Butter Diplomacy: Food and Drink as Gifts6. A Tale of Two LanternsConclusionBibliographyIndex

Michael Laver is Department Chair and Associate Professor of History at the Rochester Institute of Technology, USA. He is the author of The Sakoku Edicts and the Politics of Tokugawa Hegemony (2011) and Japan’s Economy by Proxy in the Seventeenth Century (2008).

Laver’s strength is storytelling. He makes use of many detailed examples, culled almost exclusively from the seventeenth-century 'dagregisters', to engage the reader.

• List of IllustrationsIntroduction: The VOC and the Rhythm of Life in Early Modern Japan1. Gift Giving and the Early Modern Web of Diplomacy2. The Shogun’s Menagerie: Exotic Animals as Gifts3. Objet d’art: Most Exquisite Curiosities of Nature and Art4. Curios, Rarities and European Manufactured Goods5. Butter Diplomacy: Food and Drink as Gifts6. A Tale of Two LanternsConclusionBibliographyIndex

Michael Laver is Department Chair and Associate Professor of History at the Rochester Institute of Technology, USA. He is the author of The Sakoku Edicts and the Politics of Tokugawa Hegemony (2011) and Japan’s Economy by Proxy in the Seventeenth Century (2008).

Laver’s strength is storytelling. He makes use of many detailed examples, culled almost exclusively from the seventeenth-century 'dagregisters', to engage the reader.

• List of IllustrationsIntroduction: The VOC and the Rhythm of Life in Early Modern Japan1. Gift Giving and the Early Modern Web of Diplomacy2. The Shogun’s Menagerie: Exotic Animals as Gifts3. Objet d’art: Most Exquisite Curiosities of Nature and Art4. Curios, Rarities and European Manufactured Goods5. Butter Diplomacy: Food and Drink as Gifts6. A Tale of Two LanternsConclusionBibliographyIndex