The paper deals with the ritual of gift-giving in Shakespeare's Othello. The object that is offered as a gift is a handkerchief that Othello gives to Desdemona as a token of his love. The paper tries to depict the importance this handkerchief has for the three major characters in the play (Othello, Desdemona, Iago) in order to see the reasons why this ritual of gift-giving turns in the end into a sacrificial one.