Tbilisi
We started our visit to Georgia at the recently-completed Holy trinity Cathedral...
Then we went to the History museum, which contained pre-Christian artifacts, mainly gold. Jason came to Georgia to get the golden fleece because gold mining and smithing is very old here.
Bruce visited the upstairs Museum of the Soviet Occupation. It portrays, through photos and documents, the incredibly savage and destructive Communist regime. It's a fairly compact presentation. It did not mention how other communist places were treated, nor did it fully explore the extent that home-grown Marxism. The Soviet Army was apparently welcomed when it arrived in 1921. We understand that the church here was not persecuted, but there was certainly a red terror here, with liquidations of the elites, the gulag, etc., and this is pretty well documented in the Museum.
Leslie went to the cloisonné technique reconstruction. The technique was lost for many years. Like so many crafts around the world, it is being revived. The film (really a slide show with no text) showed how the tools for process were reconstructed and then the revived technique. It is called cloisonné her but there is no wire. Some of the enamel is cut to shape and the background is brushed on. We later saw beautiful examples of the modern craft.
We then went on a walk to see views of the city.
Some of the newer buildings have novel architectures:
"House of Justice" (for recording deeds and getting drivering licenses):
Theater and Modern Art Gallery:
We had to walk down some 300-400 meters. The funicular was not working. At the bottom, we arrived at the old quarter.
Lunch was a large spread: salads, chicken salad, cheese stuffed bread (a Georgian specialty), stewed mushrooms, veal stew, pork shashlik, wonderful bread.
Then on to the Fine arts museum. More ancient gold, including this goblet dated back to the 17th century BCE:
There were also many Christian artifacts, including a remarkable collection of icons and crowns. Interestingly, there are some gifts from the Patriarch to the icons in some of the cases. Copies of one of the icons sat in the case next to the original to pick up the sanctity. They will then be sent to churches. More copies will be made.
Old town walk. The old Synagogue is in ruins and under restoration.
The new synagogue is unlike what we would expect.
Interestingly, the principal Jewish funder for the new synagogue was also a major contributor to the Holy Trinity constructions.
Which leads to a comment about Jews in Georgia, based on what we were told. The community is said to date back to the destruction of the first temple and indications are that Jews have been welcome here. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, about half of the Jews left, not because of discrimination, but due to economic conditions. Most went to Israel, and many of those kept their property and return to Georgia during the summer months. There are direct flights to Tel Aviv daily. Our local guide said she sometimes thinks that half of the tourists now are Israeli.
We then went to Sioni (Zion church, a common name, dedicated to the Assumption). It was the cathedral before Trinity. Every cathedral has a seat reserved for the Patriarch, when he visit.
The Georgians take their church very seriously. It is the Georgian Orthodox Church. The Patriarch, "Catholicos"' is seated at Trinity. The Georgian Church has been independent from the beginning, except for a time in the 18-19th when it was subject to the Russian Patriarch.
Welcome dinner with wine: walnut stuffed vegetable, chicken salad, cheese pasta packets, cheese stuffed bread, pork potato stew, chicken shashlik and more. No dessert. Quite a day.
Monday May 5
Long bus trip toward SE. We went to Dmanisi, where earliest homo erectus remain where found outside of Africa, around 1.7 - 1.8 million years old.
We then sat in a grassy field for a lecture by our Georgian archaeologist host. We learned that archaeology in Georgia under the Soviet regime was very well funded. But since then, archaeology has all but ceased; worse, it is being conducted by amateurs. All of the regional museums have closed and the artifacts have been sent to Tbilisi. He spent some time praising the Georgian character. He said that whenever a Georgian farmer finds something, he turns it over to the State. Hard to believe, but there doesn't seem to be a black market for Georgian antiquities.
After a picnic (salad with ham and cheese, chicken sandwich), we went to the Bolnisi Sioni Church, which has the oldest Georgian inscription, going back to 493 AD.
Unfortunately, our guide was not able to find someone with the key , so we did not see the interior.
We stopped at a silk batik cooperative. This was I unscheduled, but we had extra time because of the truncated church visit. The studio facility was an interesting glass enclosure, but we were not interested in the product.
Both of use are sick now, so we skipped dinner and stayed in. (Better now).
Tuesday May 6
Tbilisi to Kutaisi. A lot of walking on steep surfaces.
Next, we went to the old church above Mtskheta (sic). The church contains an important icon of St Nino.
It was she who brought Christianity to Georgia. There's a myth of curing the queen and guiding the lost king. What is interesting is her cross. She made it of vine stems tied with her hair. As a result the arms of St. Nino's cross droop. We were told they converted from Zoroastrianism.
The church had a constant stream of visitors, including a man who dragged an unhappy ram on a leash.
We climbed to a Roman site, Bagineti. The extraordinary grave goods are in history museum Tbilisi. The site includes two bath houses (one with a large mosaic), cistern, pithoi, and a six-column audience hall in an unusual shape:
Next was the cemetery in the Samtavro Valley, where archaeologists found over 4000 graves dating over a 3000-year period. All were welcome -- Christian, Jewish, Muslim, pagan graves. The first Aramaic inscription is from the 3rd century BCE, the time of the first Jewish migration to Georgia, before the destruction of the 2nd temple. The Jewish population is thought to have been 7000.
We enjoyed a great lunch. Walnut stuffed eggplant, ground meat skewer, meat dumplings with juice, PIC
and cheesy bread.
Dinner included eggplant with walnut sauce, fried chicken , ground meat skewer, stew.
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