Stuck for gift ideas? Mao bought Nixon two pandas

Historical giving, from holograms to potatoes. As a French sociologist, Marcel Mauss argued, “they place the giver and recipient in a potentially endless cycle of commitment, and established their relative positions in the social hierarchy”. But did you know that these exchanges happen between countries too? What these gifts represent often has bundles of hidden political significance. From the wooden horse of Troy to the Statue of Liberty, Matthew Sweet explores the best examples of national present giving.