Roland White
Thu, 2 November 2023
Queen Camilla feeds milk to a baby elephant during a visit to Sheldrick Wildlife Trust Elephant Orphanage in Nairobi National Park
Seeing the Queen surrounded by horses and dogs is nothing new. However, a charming photograph capturing her feeding an orphaned elephant in Nairobi’s National Park during the royal state visit to Kenya, a former British colony, has been splashed across the world’s front pages.
But, for centuries, animals have been used to smooth over potentially problematic meetings between countries. Tellingly, it’s a measure of the current sulky relationship between China and the United States that Beijing’s most successful diplomats will shortly be leaving Washington and heading home – weeks earlier than expected.
The giant pandas Mei Xiang and Tian Tian have been model ambassadors since they arrived at the Smithsonian’s National Zoo in 2000. They’ve thrilled visitors, they’ve produced four cubs, and – unlike many diplomats – they haven’t said a word out of place.
They were originally expected to return to China in December, but last week it was announced that they and their remaining cub will be off in mid-November.
Pandas from zoos in San Diego and Memphis have already gone home, and Atlanta’s bears are expected to follow next year.
What a comedown from the day just over 50 years ago when Ling-Ling and Tsing-Tsing arrived at the National Zoo, a gift from the Chinese to mark the ground-breaking visit to Beijing by US President Richard Nixon in 1972.
That gift was a diplomatic masterstroke. During the cuddly couple’s first year in Washington DC, they were seen by more than a million visitors. They proved such a hit that former Conservative prime minister Sir Edward Heath asked if Britain could have a pair as well.
Ching-Ching and Chia-Chia duly arrived at London Zoo in 1974 amid fanfare not seen since Guy the Gorilla arrived from Paris in 1947.
Guy the gorilla came to London Zoo from the zoo in Paris, in exchange for a tiger - Mirrorpix/Getty Images
Animals have been used to smooth over potentially problematic meetings between countries, including Tian Tian
“It certainly doesn’t hurt that pandas are cute,” says Canadian historian Lee Tunstall. “It’s a PR exercise that equates cute and cuddly with the origin country of the animal.”
But alas, it seems that so-called panda diplomacy has run its course. Pandas from Calgary Zoo went home to China in 2020 after a bamboo shortage in Canada.
Three-year-old Fan Xing left Ouwehands Zoo in the Netherlands in September and Edinburgh Zoo’s Yang Guang and Tian Tian (not to be confused with the Washington bear) are to be sent home before Christmas.
Animal diplomacy is as old as diplomacy itself. Envoys could fawn and flatter and bow and scrape, but nothing impressed foreign potentates like an exotic animal.
It’s said – possibly not accurately – that Cleopatra presented Julius Caesar with a giraffe in 46BC. The fate of the animal is not clear, but one account suggests that Caesar fed it to lions in front of a packed house at the Colosseum. Which seems a touch ungrateful.
A giraffe sent from Egypt to France in 1826 enjoyed a much happier fate. Zarafa travelled to Marseilles in a specially-adapted ship – with a hole cut in the deck – and from there, she headed in grand style to Paris, with special shoes, a jacket to keep away the chill, and cows to provide her with 25 litres of milk a day.
Zarafa the Nubian giraffe was gifted to Charles X of France in 1827 - Universal Images Group via Getty Images
A 30,000-strong crowd greeted her in the French capital, where she was presented to King Charles X and became a fashion sensation. Giraffe print was suddenly all the rage, and women demanded tall “giraffe” hair styles. For the next 18 years, she lived in the city’s botanical gardens.
In animal diplomacy, receiving – and then displaying said beast – is just as important as giving. As Julius Caesar was no doubt aware, exotic animals offer great benefits to despots who wish to awe and impress the unruly masses. Henry III, who ruled England for 56 years in the 13th century, certainly knew the value of putting on a show.
In 1252, Londoners were treated to a rare sight indeed – that of a white bear swimming in the Thames by the Tower of London. The polar bear, muzzled and chained to stop it escaping, was a gift to Henry from the King of Norway.
Henry kept a menagerie of rare beasts at the Tower, including three lions presented by the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II in 1235 and an elephant from the King of France. From then on, an ever-evolving royal menagerie was kept in a specially built Lion Tower until the early 1830s, when it was moved to the newly-created London Zoo.
“This is the exotic as an expression of respect and power,” says Professor Jeremy Black, an Exeter University historian and author of A History of Diplomacy. “As a symbolic expression of goodwill, [gifting animals] works well.”
Two pandas, Ling-Ling and Tsing-Tsing arrived at the National Zoo in Washington to mark the ground-breaking visit to Beijing by US President Richard Nixon in 1972 - Getty Images
Animals still play a part in diplomacy, but most gifts are far more prosaic. When Keir Starmer visited President Macron earlier this year, the Labour leader presented the French president with an Arsenal top. In return, he received a pair of cufflinks. At least it wasn’t socks. And let’s be honest, less colourful gifts are a safe option, because animal diplomacy can sometimes backfire.
There was uproar on Chinese social media sites earlier this year at claims that Mei Xiang and Tian Tian were being mistreated. Under the hashtag “Save Mei Xiang” the Americans were accused of subjecting the panda to painful artificial insemination. The zoo vehemently denied the allegation, which was also dismissed by fact checkers from the news agency AFP.
In 2007, Vladimir Putin took his black Labrador Konni to a meeting with Angela Merkel. If the Russian president wanted to show off his cuddly side, it didn’t work. The German chancellor is scared of dogs. President Putin claims he didn’t know this, but the incident was a diplomatic disaster.
“I understand why he has to do this,” Chancellor Merkel said later. “He’s afraid of his own weakness. Russia has nothing – no successful politics or economy. All they have is this.”
Not even cuddly pandas are universally welcomed. Plans by China to give two bears to Taiwan were fiercely denounced in 2005 by the island’s pro-independence government. “The pandas are a trick, just like the Trojan horse,” said one Taipei MP.
But perhaps the most unfortunate example of animal diplomacy featured Winston Churchill. In 1943, when you’d think he had more important things on his mind, he asked the Australian government for six platypuses.
The naturalist Gerald Durrell thought the idea was “magnificently idiotic” and the Australians seemed to agree. They eventually sent just one, a male called Winston (of course he was called Winston).
Angela Merkel was less than pleased to be introduced to Putin's labrador - Sergei Chirikov/EPA/Shutterstock
Unfortunately, Winston 2.0’s ship was spotted towards the end of its journey by a German submarine. The ship’s captain dropped depth charges, and the platypus was killed by the shock of the distant explosions.
Following this difficult incident, the British ability to accept healthy animals happily improved. In fact, the late Queen received so many animal gifts that she could have opened her own zoo. The website of the Royal Collection Trust lists 36 separate donations.
King Faisal of Iraq gave an Arab stallion in 1953 to mark the coronation, and since then she’s received pigs, hippopotami, swans, kangaroos, toucans, sloths, an armadillo, an elephant from Cameroon called Jumbo, and a couple of giant tortoises.
Naturally, horses were the most popular gift. Foreign monarchs and governments always knew that a new horse would be gratefully received. However, there were exceptions: when the Soviet Union presented a stallion in 1956, they also threw in a three-month old bear for Princess Anne.
But perhaps the oddest gift came from traders in Hudson Bay Company. When Charles II granted a royal charter for the hunting and sale of beavers in 1670, the company was obliged in return to present two black beaver skins and two elk heads to any monarch from the home country who happened to be passing and this British-Canadian tradition continued.
The Queen visited Canada in 1970, and was duly presented with two beavers in a tank. As she leaned over to inspect them, the beavers became – how can we put this politely? – somewhat frisky.
“Whatever are they doing?” she asked.
“Ma’am, it’s no use asking me,” said Viscount Amory, then chairman of the company. “I’m a bachelor.”
Now that’s what you call diplomacy.
No comments:
Post a Comment