THE LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE OF GEORGIA.
The origin of the Kartlian or Kartvelian language is still involved in some doubt, but the general opinion of philologists seems to be that it does not belong to the Indo-European family, although it has been powerfully influenced by Zend, Sanskrit, Persian, and Armenian. The ancient speech of the country is preserved to us in the ecclesiastical rituals and books of devotion, which are written in characters differing very considerably from the civil alphabet, the “war hand,” the invention of the latter being ascribed to King Pharnavaz I., a contemporary of Alexander the Great. The Khutsuri, or ecclesiastical character, bears a striking resemblance to Armenian; an excellent specimen of it may be seen in the British Museum Library, in the famous Moscow Bible of 1743, recently purchased. The number of letters is the same in both alphabets, viz. thirty-eight, and the modern alphabet is as follows:—
| ა | a | ს | s |
| ბ | b | ტ | t |
| გ | g | უ | u (oo) |
| დ | d | ჳ | vi (vee) |
| ე | e | ფ | ph (p followed by sound of h) |
| ვ | v | ქ | k |
| ზ | z | ღ | gh (guttural) |
| ჱ | é (short) | ყ | (something like a guttural k) |
| თ | th (not English th but t followed by sound of h) | შ | sh |
| ი | i (English ee) | ჩ | ch |
| კ | c | ც | tz |
| ლ | l | ძ | dz |
| მ | m | წ | ts |
| ნ | n | ჭ | dch |
| ჲ | i (short) | ხ | kh |
| ო | o | ჴ | khh |
| პ | p | ჯ | j |
| ჟ | zh | ჰ | h |
| რ | r | ჵ | ho |
The orthography is purely phonetic. There is very little difference between the language of the sacred books and that of to-day, not nearly so much as between Anglo-Saxon and English; but many foreign words have been introduced in modern times.
The earliest specimens of Georgian literature which have come down to us are translations of the Scriptures, and theological works written under the influence of the Greek clergy, who, until the eleventh century, occupied almost all the high ecclesiastical offices in the land.
In the eleventh and twelfth centuries of our era the relations between Georgia and Greece were of the most intimate character. The young nobles of the court of King David the Renewer and his immediate successors frequented the schools of Athens, and brought back with them Platonic and Aristotelian teachings which exerted a very powerful influence on the intellectual and social life of that period, and prepared the way for the golden age of Georgian literature, which dawned on the accession of Queen Tamara. Sulkhan Orbeliani, in the preface to his dictionary, compiled early in the eighteenth century, says that he consulted translations of Proklus, Platonicus, Nemesis, Aristotle, Damascenus, Plato, Porphyry, and many other Greek writers. If these MSS. were still extant, they might prove valuable to classical scholars.
RUSTAVELI.
Page 139.
During the stormy times that soon followed, the countless lyrical pieces which were produced were nearly all lost, but the epic which is now looked upon as the greatest masterpiece in the language has escaped with but a few mutilations. This is “The Man in the Panther’s Skin” (Vepkhvis Tkaosani) by Shota Rustaveli.
History tells us very little about Shota Rustaveli. We only know that he was born in the village of Rustavi, near Akhaltsikhe, that he received his education in Athens, returned to his native land, where he wrote his great work, was secretary to Queen Tamara, then became a monk, and died in the monastery of the Holy Cross, near Jerusalem, where his portrait may still be seen. Tradition says that the poet was passionately enamoured of his royal mistress, and this assertion seems to be borne out by many passages in the poem.
During nearly seven centuries of ceaseless struggles for freedom, the Georgians have kept this great work fresh in their minds. It has inspired them with hope and courage in the darkest hours, and at the present day it is as great a favourite as it ever was. Not only are many of its verses household words in cottage and hall, but there are not a few Georgians, especially among the women, who know every word of it by heart; indeed, there was a time when no woman was allowed to marry unless she could repeat the whole poem. The reason for this extraordinary popularity is to be found in the fact that the poem is a thoroughly national one in its smallest details. Although the heroes and heroines are described as Arabians, Indians, Chinese, they are all Georgians to the very finger tips.
The plot is of the simplest description possible. Rostevan, a patriarchal Eastern king, who has renounced the throne of Arabia in favour of his daughter Tinatina, is out hunting one day with Avtandil, one of his generals, when he sees a weeping youth of wondrous beauty, dressed in a panther’s skin. The king orders his guards to seize the stranger, but the latter kills several of them and mysteriously escapes, whereupon the old king falls into a fit of sadness so deep that Tinatina at length promises her hand to the knight who will satisfy her father’s curiosity. Avtandil sets out to seek the man in the panther’s skin, wanders about for three years, meeting with wondrous adventures, before he finds the object of his search, who turns out to be Tariel, a young knight enamoured of Nestan Daredjan, daughter of the king of India, and then returns to claim the hand of his queen.
In Avtandil we have a Christian chevalier of the East who is worthy of comparison with our Rolands and Red Cross Knights, while Tariel is a wild Mussulman, whose passion drives him to excesses worthy of Amadis of Gaul.
The interest is powerfully sustained all through the poem, and its dramatic unity is never lost sight of; yet, however interesting the narrative may be, it is chiefly as a picture of life in Georgia in the days of Tamara that “The Man in the Panther’s Skin” is valuable.
Tinatina, who is none other than Tamara herself, is described as follows:—
“One daughter only had the aged king,
And she was fair as is the Eastern sun.
He upon whom her gaze but once did rest
Was ravish’d of his heart and soul and thought.”
Tinatina is a beautiful type of womanhood, such as we might expect to find in the literature of Western Europe, but hardly in a little country standing alone amid the wild hordes of Asia. Her wisdom, her strength of character, the purity and loyalty of her love, have made her the model of many a generation of Rustaveli’s countrywomen, who have ever behaved nobly alike in joy and sorrow.
Avtandil is thus portrayed:—
“A prince’s son was Avtandil, the very first
’Mong all the bravest warriors of the aged king
His form was slender as the cypress-tree,
And clear and beauteous was his piercing glance.
Though young, his soul was true and strong
As adamant is hard.
The fire from Tinatina’s eyes had long
Set his young heart aflame with strong desire,
And stricken him with wounds that never heal’d.
Many a day he hid his burning love,
And sunder’d from his mistress, all the red
Fled from his roselike, tender cheeks;
But soon as fate did bring him near to her again,
The wildly beating heart crimson’d his face,
And all his aching wounds did gape afresh.
Thus hidden love doth torture youthful breasts.”
From “The Man in the Panther’s Skin” we learn that the ideal hero of Rustaveli’s times was distinguished for bravery, truthfulness, loyalty to promises, self-sacrifice, munificence, and burning love.
“Falsehood’s the root of all the thousand ills
That curse our race. Lying and faithlessness twin sisters are.
Why should I try to cheat my fellow-man?
Is this the use to which my learning should be put?
Ah, no! far other aims our hearts inspire,
We learn, that we may near the angelic choir.”
The most famous line in the whole poem is, perhaps, the one which says:—
“A glorious death is better than a life of shame.”
And many a warrior has sought death, in the hour of defeat, with these words on his lips.
Another verse which has become proverbial is:—
“That which thou dost on other’s wants bestow, is thine,
While that thou hoardest is all lost to thee.”
The ideas of love expressed by Rustaveli are partly of the Ovidian type, without any of the indelicacy of the Latin poet. But he had not studied Plato for nought, and we see in his work traces of those metaphysical theories which S. Bonaventura, Dante, and many of their contemporaries and successors found in Christianity.
In the last strophe we have a prophecy, conscious or unconscious, of the evil days that were about to dawn.
“Their deeds are ended, like a dream at night.
With them their golden age has ended too.
Far other days have dawn’d.
Such is that old deceiver Time; he makes
That which at first did everlasting seem
As short as is the twinkling of an eye.”
As far as style is concerned, we find that Rustaveli strikingly resembles the European writers of his own time, to wit the troubadours, and we can easily imagine that his career was not unlike that of some of those sweet singers who enjoyed the favour of the noble ladies of France and Italy. Among the great poets of Europe, Ariosto and Tasso are, perhaps, the ones who are most akin to Rustaveli. The Platonism of the latter furnishes another ground of resemblance, in addition to the similarity of theme.
The poem in its present form consists of about 1600 quatrains. There are sixteen syllables in each line, and the four lines end with the same rhyme. The rhythm is due to the accents, as in English verse, and may be called hexametric, i.e. there are in each line six feet, divided into two sets of three by means of the cæsura; the fourth line invariably begins with the particle i, which does not count as a syllable.
As far as I know, the poem has not been translated into any European language; although fragments and abstracts of it have been published in Russian and Polish magazines, and I have seen the name of “Rostavvelo” quoted in one of Gioberti’s works. By the publication of a carefully collated text, about a year ago, Georgian critics have prepared the way for those who may wish to make the national epic known to European readers.
Among the contemporaries of Rustaveli may be mentioned the following:—
Chakhrukhadze, the author of the “Tamariani,” a long poem in honour of Queen Tamara; it is composed entirely of epithets, thus:—
“Tamartsknari, shesatsknari, khmanarnari, pirmtsinari,
Mse mtsinari, sachinari, tskalimknari, momdinari,”
i.e.
“Tamara, the mild, the pleasing, the sweetly speaking, the kindly smiling,
The sunlike shining one, the majestic, the gently moving, like a full river.”
Shavteli was even more highly prized than Rustaveli, but his greatest work is lost. Khoneli and Tmokveli, the former in “Daredjaniani,” the latter in “Visramiani” and “Dilariani,” have left us romances of chivalry and adventure which are still much admired, and are well worthy of comparison with the best European literature of the same class. About the same time the national chronicle, called “Kartlis tzkhovreba,” i.e. Georgia’s Life, was written.
This period of literary activity was brought to an abrupt close by the terrible invasion of Genghis Khan, and for about four centuries the incessant wars in which the country was engaged gave plenty of opportunity for acting romances, but little time for writing them.
Towards the end of the seventeenth century Prince Sulkhan Orbeliani described his “Journey through Europe,” and wrote a collection of fables and folk-tales, lately published in Russian. Orbeliani had lived at the court of Louis XIV., and was very friendly with La Fontaine, who is indebted to the Georgian prince for some of his fables. His greatest service to his country was, however, the compilation of a dictionary, containing 25,000 words, which has formed the basis for all later lexicographical works.
In 1712 King Vakhtang VI. opened a printing office in Tiflis, and issued the chief poems and romances of the Tamarian period at such a price as to make them attainable by all his subjects. Irakli II., of glorious memory, continued to act as the Augustus of Georgian literature, and in the Catholicos Antoni it found a Mæcenas or Pollio. The chief writers of the eighteenth century were Prince Vakhusht, son of Vakhtang VI., who compiled a “History of Georgia” and a “Geography of Georgia,” and the Catholicos Antoni, who published many educational and religious works. Guramoshvili and Savatnava sang the triumphs of Irakli in powerful lyrics which are still familiar to every peasant.
The following serenade belongs to this period; it was copied down by Pushkin in 1829, and he says of it, “There is in it a certain Oriental inconsequence which is not altogether devoid of poetical worth.”
“Soul newly born in Paradise!
Soul made for my delight!
From thee, thou deathless one,
I wait for life.
From thee, thou flowery springtide, moon but two weeks old,
From thee, my guardian angel,
I wait for life.
With joyous smiles thy face doth shine.
I would not change thy glance against the throne of all the world.
From thee I wait for life.
Rose of the mountain, wet with the dew of dawn!
Nature’s chief favourite! Hidden treasure house!
From thee I wait for life.”
It was not, however, until the present century was well begun, that Georgian poetry abandoned the “Oriental inconsequence” to which I have just referred; the literary awakening which began about sixty or seventy years ago was largely due to the work of Western poets, such as Byron, with whom the Georgians became familiar chiefly through Pushkin and Lermontov. Prince Alexander Chavchavadze (1786–1846), a general in the Russian service, was the founder of the modern school; his song is all of love and wine. The influence of Western romanticism is still more clearly visible in the earlier productions of Baratashvili (1816–1846), but he succeeded in throwing off the gloomy misanthropy of his youth, and had the courage to acknowledge that he had been deluded by that “evil spirit” of Byronism.
To Prince Giorgi Eristavi fell the task of familiarizing his countrymen with the poetical literature of Europe. He was exiled to Poland for his share in a plot against the Russian government, and spent his leisure in studying Mickiewicz, Schiller, Petrarch, and Pushkin, selections from whose works he published in his native tongue. On his return to Tiflis he founded a National Theatre, for which he himself wrote many comedies. With Eristavi sentimentalism died, and the poets who succeeded him sought inspiration in patriotic ideals.
Prince Grigor Orbeliani (1801–1883), sang the past splendour of his fatherland, and bewailed the low estate to which it had fallen. In his “Ode to Tamara’s portrait” he beseeches the great queen to look down with pity on Georgia, and bless her sons with strength and wisdom; he despairingly asks:—
“Shall that which once was wither’d, ne’er again
Enjoy the fragrance of its former bloom?
Shall that which fell, for ever fallen remain,
O’erwhelm’d in an unchanging, cruel doom?”
His lines on the death of Irakli II. breathe the same spirit:—
“Ah! full of splendour were the fateful days
That saw the quenching of thy quickening light,
Thou sun of Georgia, yet thy dazzling rays
Still lighten up the darkness of our night.
“Thine all-o’erpowering sword, whose mighty blows
Scatter’d like chaff the bravest of the brave,
Shall never more affright thy country’s foes—
Georgia’s fame lies buried in thy grave.”
Orbeliani had a warm heart for the poor and suffering, and his “Lopiana the Fisherman” and “Bokuladze the Musha” (a musha is a carrier of heavy burdens) are masterpieces in their way.
While Orbeliani’s eyes are ever turned regretfully to the past, Akaki Tsereteli (born 1840) looks hopefully forward to the future:—
“Ah no! our love is not yet dead,
It only sleeps awhile....”
In elegant yet forcible lyrics he invites his countrymen to manfully follow the path of progress. Tsereteli has written a great historical poem called “Torniki,” and is, besides, an orator and publicist of the first rank.
Of the same school is Prince Ilia Chavchavadze (born 1837), who is in many respects the most remarkable man that Georgia possesses. All his poems, and indeed all his work, whether as a poet, a novelist, a journalist, an orator, or a financier, breathe a spirit of the loftiest patriotism. The return of spring and the awakening of bird and flower to fuller life are to him a reminder of the long-delayed awakening of his beloved land; his elegies on the Kura, the Aragva, the Alazana are all full of the same feeling. It is, however, in “Lines to the Georgian mother” that he most clearly expresses his ideas; after reminding the matrons of Georgia how they have served their country in times past, cheerfully sending their sons forth to the fight and sustaining their courage in the hour of misfortune, he says:—
“... But why should we shed idle tears
For glory that will ne’er return?
The ever-flowing stream of years
Leaves us no time to idly mourn.
“’Tis ours to tread an untried path,
‘Tis ours the future to prepare.
If forward thou dost urge thy sons,
Then answer’d is my earnest prayer.
“This is the task that waits for thee,
Thou virtuous mother of our land,
Strengthen thy sons, that they may be
Their country’s stay with heart and hand.
“Inspire them with fraternal love,
Freedom, equality and right,
Teach them to struggle ‘gainst all ill,
And give them courage for the fight.”
Chavchavadze’s tales and poems have done more than anything else to awaken the Georgian people to a sense of the duties they have to perform in the altered conditions under which they now live. His poem, “Memoirs of a Robber,” which portrayed the lazy country squires who lived on the toil of their serfs, made a powerful impression on the class it was meant for; and the tale, “Is that a man?” which describes the life of a young noble who spends his whole time in eating, drinking, sleeping and folly, brought a blush to the faces of hundreds of his countrymen, and prompted them to seek a worthier mode of existence. At first, the more conservative part of the nobility were bitterly opposed to the radical ideas of Chavchavadze, but he has now succeeded in bringing round the majority of them to his way of thinking. He is editor of a daily paper, Iveria, which is read by all classes of society, and most of his time is spent between his journalistic duties and the management of the nobles’ Land Bank, an institution founded for the relief of the farmers.
Besides those I have mentioned, Chavchavadze has written many other works; with the following extract from “The Phantom” I conclude this brief notice of him:—
“O Georgia, thou pearl and ornament of the world. What sorrow and misfortune hast thou not undergone for the Christian faith! Tell me, what other land has had so thorny a path to tread? Where is the land that has maintained such a fight twenty centuries long without disappearing from the earth? Thou alone, Georgia, couldst do it. No other people can compare with thee for endurance. How often have thy sons freely shed their blood for thee! Every foot of thy soil is made fruitful by it. And even when they bowed under oppression they always bravely rose again. Faith and freedom were their ideals.”
The novel of social life is represented by Prince Kazbek, a young and energetic writer, many of whose productions have appeared as serials in the newspapers. The best writer of historical novels is Rtsheuli; his “Queen Tamara” is a great favourite with the people.
PRINCE ILIA CHAVCHAVADZE.
PRINCE IVANÉ MACHABELI.
Page 152.
The National Theatre is kept well supplied with new and original comedies by Tsagareli and others, and Prince Ivané Machabeli, who, as far as I know, is the only Georgian who can read English literature in the original, has translated some of Shakspeare’s plays; these always draw a full house, and are thoroughly appreciated. Leaving out of the question “King Lear,” which has a special interest for the people, on account of its reminding them of Irakli II., this hearty admiration for Shakspeare is somewhat remarkable; in my opinion it is to be explained by the fact that the Georgian people are in almost the same state of intellectual and social development as were our forefathers in the days of Queen Elizabeth, and they can, therefore, the more fully enter into our great poet’s way of thinking. Besides the essential part of his work, the effect of which on the minds of men will always be the same, there is an accessory part, a tone, an atmosphere, which more particularly belongs to the early part of a period of transition from feudalism to freedom, from faith to rationalism, from the activity of war to the activity of peace; ten or a dozen generations have lived in England since this stage in our history was reached; in Georgia there still live men who were born in the age of chivalry and adventure.
Prince Machabeli, in spite of the fact that he is only about thirty years of age, is, perhaps, after Prince Ilia Chavchavadze, the man who enjoys the greatest influence among his fellow-countrymen. His studies at the University of Paris, and his intimate acquaintance with the intellectual and social life of Europe, have enabled him to bring the younger generation at least to a fuller appreciation of the superiority of the West over the East; everything which savours of Asia is now rigidly proscribed or ridiculed, and Romano-Germanic ideals prevail. As the editor of Droeba (Time), a capital daily paper, Machabeli had an opportunity of spreading his opinions throughout the country, but an imprudent article brought about the suppression of the journal by the Censure.
This notice would be incomplete without a brief reference to the venerable Bishop Gabriel of Kutais, whose homilies are at once elegant in style and simple in doctrine; they have had a very powerful influence on the Georgian people, and their author is sincerely loved by all his countrymen. An English translation of his earlier sermons has been published by the Rev. S. C. Malan.
BISHOP GABRIEL OF KUTAÏS.
Page 154.
The popular literature of Georgia is rich in folk-tales, fables, ballads, riddles, &c., and would well repay an attentive study (v. Bibliography).