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Kartuli
Georgian (, , ) is the most widely-spoken Kartvelian language, and serves as the literary language or lingua franca for speakers of related languages. It is the official language of Georgia and the native or primary language of 87.6% of its population. Its speakers today number approximately four million. Classification No claimed genetic links between the Kartvelian languages and any other language family in the world are accepted in mainstream linguistics. Among the Kartvelian languages, Georgian is most closely related to the so-called Zan languages (Megrelian and Laz); glottochronological studies indicate that it split from the latter approximately 2700 years ago. Svan is a more distant relative that split off much earlier, perhaps 4000 years ago. Dialects Standard Georgian is largely based on the Kartlian dialect.
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Laz Language
The Laz language (; ka, ლაზური ენა/ჭანური ენა, tr; tr, Lazca, tr) is a Kartvelian language spoken by the Laz people on the southeastern shore of the Black Sea. In 2007, it was estimated that there were around 20,000 native speakers in Turkey, in a strip of land extending from Melyat to the Georgian border (officially called Lazistan until 1925), and around 1,000 native speakers around Adjara in Georgia. There are also around 1,000 native speakers of Laz in Germany. Laz is not a written language nor a literary language. According to Benninghaus, the Laz themselves have no interest in writing in Laz. Classification Laz is one of the four Kartvelian languages. Along with Mingrelian, it forms the Zan branch of this Kartvelian language family. The two languages are very closely related, to the extent that some linguists refer to Mingrelian and Laz as dialects or regional variants of a single ''Zan language'', a view held officially in the ...
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Georgians
The Georgians, or Kartvelians (; ka, ქართველები, tr, ), are a nation and indigenous Caucasian ethnic group native to Georgia and the South Caucasus. Georgian diaspora communities are also present throughout Russia, Turkey, Greece, Iran, Ukraine, United States, and European Union. Georgians arose from Colchian and Iberian civilizations of classical antiquity; Colchis was interconnected with the Hellenic world, whereas Iberia was influenced by the Achaemenid Empire until Alexander the Great conquered it. In the 4th century, the Georgians became one of the first to embrace Christianity and now the majority of Georgians are Orthodox Christians, with most following their national autocephalous Georgian Orthodox Church, although there are small Georgian Catholic and Muslim communities as well as a significant number of irreligious Georgians. Located in the Caucasus, on the continental crossroads of Europe and Asia, the High Middle Ages saw Georgian people form ...
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Georgian Scripts
The Georgian scripts are the three writing systems used to write the Georgian language: Asomtavruli, Nuskhuri and Mkhedruli. Although the systems differ in appearance, their letters share the same names and alphabetical order and are written horizontally from left to right. Of the three scripts, Mkhedruli, once the civilian royal script of the Kingdom of Georgia and mostly used for the royal charters, is now the standard script for modern Georgian and its related Kartvelian languages, whereas Asomtavruli and Nuskhuri are used only by the Georgian Orthodox Church, in ceremonial religious texts and iconography. Georgian scripts are unique in their appearance and their exact origin has never been established; however, in strictly structural terms, their alphabetical order largely corresponds to the Greek alphabet, with the exception of letters denoting uniquely Georgian sounds, which are grouped at the end. Originally consisting of 38 letters, Georgian is presently written in a 33 ...
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Svan Language
Svan ( ''lušnu nin''; ka, სვანური ენა, tr) is a Kartvelian language spoken in the western Georgian region of Svaneti primarily by the Svan people. With its speakers variously estimated to be between 30,000 and 80,000, the UNESCO designates Svan as a "definitely endangered language". It is of particular interest because it has retained many archaic features that have been lost in the other Kartvelian languages. Features Familial features Like all languages of the Caucasian language family, Svan has a large number of consonants. It has agreement between subject and object, and a split-ergative morphosyntactic system. Verbs are marked for aspect, evidentiality and "version". Distinguishing features Svan retains the voiceless aspirated uvular plosive, , and the glides /w/ and /j/. It has a larger vowel inventory than Georgian; the Upper Bal dialect of Svan has the most vowels of any South-Caucasian language, having both long and short versions of plus , a ...
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The Knight In The Panther's Skin
''The Knight in the Panther's Skin'' ( ka, ვეფხისტყაოსანი, tr literally "the one with the skin of a tiger") is a Georgian medieval epic poem, written in the 12th or 13th century by Georgia's national poet Shota Rustaveli. A definitive work of the Georgian Golden Age, the poem consists of over 1600 Rustavelian Quatrains and is considered to be a "masterpiece of the Georgian literature". Until the early 20th century, a copy of this poem was part of the dowry of every bride. Although the poem takes place in the fictional settings of "India" and "Arabia", events in these distant lands are but a colorful allegory of the rule of Queen Tamar of Georgia, and the size and glory of the Kingdom of Georgia in its Golden Age. It tells the friendship of two heroes, Avtandil and Tariel, and their quest to find the object of love, Nestan-Darejan, an allegorical embodiment of Queen Tamar. These idealized heroes and devoted friends are united by courtly love, generosi ...
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National Epic
A national epic is an epic poem or a literary work of epic scope which seeks or is believed to capture and express the essence or spirit of a particular nation—not necessarily a nation state, but at least an ethnic or linguistic group with aspirations to independence or autonomy. National epics frequently recount the origin of a nation, a part of its history, or a crucial event in the development of national identity such as other national symbols. History In medieval times Homer's ''Iliad'' was taken to be based on historical facts, and the Trojan War came to be considered as seminal in the genealogies of European monarchies. Virgil's ''Aeneid'' was taken to be the Roman equivalent of the ''Iliad'', starting from the Fall of Troy and leading up to the birth of the young Roman nation. According to the then prevailing conception of history, empires were born and died in organic succession and correspondences existed between the past and the present. Geoffrey of Monmouth ...
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Cambridge University Press
Cambridge University Press is the university press of the University of Cambridge. Granted letters patent by Henry VIII of England, King Henry VIII in 1534, it is the oldest university press A university press is an academic publishing house specializing in monographs and scholarly journals. Most are nonprofit organizations and an integral component of a large research university. They publish work that has been reviewed by schola ... in the world. It is also the King's Printer. Cambridge University Press is a department of the University of Cambridge and is both an academic and educational publisher. It became part of Cambridge University Press & Assessment, following a merger with Cambridge Assessment in 2021. With a global sales presence, publishing hubs, and offices in more than 40 Country, countries, it publishes over 50,000 titles by authors from over 100 countries. Its publishing includes more than 380 academic journals, monographs, reference works, school and uni ...
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Kevin Tuite
Kevin Tuite ( Irish: ''Caoimhín de Tiúit''; born April 3, 1954) is a full Professor of Anthropology at the Université de Montréal. He is a citizen of both Canada and Ireland.Official CV
Université de Montréal
His special interest is in Caucasian linguistics, and he has occasionally published on the topic of .


Biography

Tuite was born 3 April 1954, in , USA. He received a BA in

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Christianization Of Georgia
The Christianization of Iberia ( ka, ქართლის გაქრისტიანება, tr) refers to the spread of Christianity in the early 4th century by the sermon of Saint Nino in an ancient Georgian kingdom of Kartli, known as Iberia in classical antiquity, which resulted in declaring it as a state religion by ''then-pagan'' King Mirian III of Iberia. Per Sozomen, this led the king's "large and warlike '' barbarian'' nation to confess Christ and renounce the religion of their fathers", as the polytheistic Georgians had long-established anthropomorphic idols, known as the "Gods of Kartli". The king would become the main sponsor, architect, initiator and an organizing power of all building processes. Per Socrates of Constantinople, the "Iberians first embraced the Christian faith" alongside the Abyssinians, but the exact date of an event is still debated. Georgian monarchs, alongside the Armenians, were among the first anywhere in the world to convert to a Chris ...
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Iakob Tsurtaveli
Jacob of Tsurtavi ( ka, იაკობ ცურტაველი, tr) also known as Jacob the Priest (იაკობ ხუცესი, Iakob Khutsesi) was the 5th-century Georgian religious writer and priest from Tsurtavi, then the major town of Gogarene and the Lower Iberia. A personal priest of Saint Shushanik and an eyewitness of her martyrdom at the hand of her spouse, bidaxae Varsken, Jacob compiled her life in his hagiographic novel the Martyrdom of the Holy Queen Shushanik, the oldest surviving work of the Georgian literature written between 476 and 483. Except for scarce information obtained from his work, nothing more is known about Jacob’s life. See also *List of Georgian writers References #მ. საბინინი, საქართველოს სამოთხე, გვ. 182-192; #იაკობ ცურტაველი, მარტვილობაÁ შუშანიკისი, ქართული და სომხური ...
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Martyrdom Of The Holy Queen Shushanik
The ''Martyrdom of the Holy Queen Shushanik'' (also translated as ''The Passion of Saint Shushanik''; ka, წამებაჲ წმიდისა შუშანიკისი დედოფლისაჲ, tr) is the earliest surviving piece of Georgian literature. Purported to have been written between 476 and 483, the earliest surviving manuscript dates back to the 10th century and was written at Parkhali Monastery. There exists an Armenian translation of the same text, dated also to the 10th century. The author is Iakob Tsurtaveli (Jacob of Tsurtavi), a contemporary and participant in the events described in this hagiographic novel. The manuscript describes the martyrdom of Saint Shushanik, an Armenian noblewoman, at the hand of her spouse, ''bidaxshe'' (high prince) Varsken, who had renounced Christianity and embraced Zoroastrianism. Shushanik, whose father was Vardan Mamikonyan, the '' sparapet'' (military leader) of the Christians in Armenia, refused to follow him, ...
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Palimpsest
In textual studies, a palimpsest () is a manuscript page, either from a scroll or a book, from which the text has been scraped or washed off so that the page can be reused for another document. Parchment was made of lamb, calf, or kid skin and was expensive and not readily available, so, in the interest of economy, a page was often re-used by scraping off the previous writing. In colloquial usage, the term ''palimpsest'' is also used in architecture, archaeology and geomorphology to denote an object made or worked upon for one purpose and later reused for another; for example, a monumental brass the reverse blank side of which has been re-engraved. Etymology The word ''palimpsest'' derives from the Latin '' palimpsestus'', which derives from the Ancient Greek παλίμψηστος (, from + = 'again' + 'scrape'), a compound word that describes the process: "The original writing was scraped and washed off, the surface resmoothed, and the new literary material written o ...
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