The Role of Gifts and Purchases in Shaping the Epistolary Expression of Emotions in the Letters of Konstancja Czapska née Gnińska, Wife of the Pomeranian Voivode

Abstract

Based on an extensive collection of letters of the Pomeranian Voivode’s wife Konstancja Czapska, the widow of Piotr Jan Czapski (1685–1736), addressed mainly to her daughter Magdalena and Magdalena’s husband Duke Hieronim Florian Radziwiłł, written in the 1740s and 1750s, the article is to illustrate the role which everyday objects sent between them – such as treats, items of clothing, but also valuables in the form of fine jewellery – played in the formation of an emotional bond at a distance. The sources under examination allow us to sketch a picture of the material needs and tastes characteristic of the House of Wettin period, but above all to show how writing about this sphere of life contributed to the enrichment of the epistolary style. Family-oriented language, centred on the minutiae of everyday life, served as a powerful means of expressing emotions. The analysis also demonstrates the letter writer’s use of references to motifs drawn from literature and culture, which allowed her to imbue the items she sent with additional, often metaphorical meaning.