Armazi (Georgian: არმაზი) is a locale in Georgia, 2 km northwest of Mtskheta and 22 km north of Tbilisi. Georgian (ka ქართული ენა kartuli ena) is the Official language of Georgia, a country in the Caucasus. Georgia ( საქართველო, Sakartvelo) is a Transcontinental country in the Caucasus region situated at the dividing line between Mtskheta (მცხეთა one of the oldest cities of the country of Georgia (in Kartli province of Eastern Georgia is located approximately 20 kilometers northeast Tbilisi (ˌtbiˈliːsi in Georgian: თბილისი is the capital and the largest city of the Republic of Georgia, lying on the banks of the Mt'k'vari A part of historical Greater Mtskheta, it is a place where the ancient city of the same name and the original capital of the early Georgian kingdom of Kartli or Iberia was located. Kartli (ქართლი is the largest and most populated province of Eastern Georgia. This article is about the people of ancient Georgia For the Iberians of ancient Iberian Peninsula see Iberians. It particularly flourished in the early centuries of the Anno Domini and was destroyed by the Arab invasion in the 730s. The araB gene Promoter is a bacterial promoter activated by e L-arabinose binding
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Archaeology
Minor excavations on the territory of Armazi carried out in 1890 revealed the plinth of adobe town walls, with stone steps, and cleared the two-room structure, where fragments of a woman's torso of the 1st century AD were discovered. From 1943 to 1948 large-scale excavation was undertaken under Andria Apakidze of the Georgian Academy of Sciences, resumed in 1985 and continuing. Andria Apakidze (ანდრია აფაქიძე ( September 3, 1914 - November 25, 2005) Doctor of History and professor was a The Georgian National Academy of Sciences ( GAS) ( Georgian: საქართველოს მეცნიერებათა ეროვნული აკადემია These have shown that the adobe town walls and towers, built upon a plinth of hewn stone in the first half of the 1st century AD, surrounded the hill top and the side sloping down towards the river, an area of 30 ha. The land within the walls was terraced and various buildings were sited on the terraces.
The three major cultural layers have been identified: the earliest dates back to the 4th-3rd century BC (Armazi I), the middle one is from the 3rd-1st century BC (Armazi II), and the relatively newer structure belongs to the 1st-6th century AD (Armazi III). Armazi I is constructed of massive stone blocks forming an impregnable base but were finished off by less durable mud brick. It also contains a great hall of six columns with a tiled roof. Armazi II is noted for a temple with an apse. Armazi III is the richest layer constructed of elegantly cut stone blocks, joined together with lime mortar and metal clamps. Among the surviving structures are the royal palace, several richly decorated tombs, a bathhouse and a small stone mausoleum. [1]
The area is now a state-protected field museum administered as a part of the National Archaeology Museum-Reserve of Greater Mtskheta. [2]
History
Archaeological evidences testify that the ancient Armazi was far more extensive than it is today. Armazi's strategic situation was dictated by its ready access to the Daryal Pass, the main road over the Greater Caucasus, through which the Scythians invaded the ancient Near East. The Darial Gorge (Дарьял დარიალის ხეობა Darielis Kheoba) is the gorge on the border between Russia and Georgia. Greater Caucasus (Большой Кавказ Azerbaijani: Böyük Qafqaz Dağları sometimes translated as "Caucasus Major" "Big Caucasus" or "Large The Scythians or Scyths (Σκύθες Σκύθοι were an Iranian speaking people of horse-riding Nomadic pastoralists who dominated the Pontic B Syria - Belka Woman from Damascus Arab from Baghdadjpg|thumb|Inhabitants of the Near East late nineteenth century
The name of the city and its dominant acropolis, Armaz-Tskihke (literally, "citadel of Armazi"; არმაზციხე), is usually taken to derive from Armazi, the chief deity of the pagan Iberian pantheon. Acropolis (Gr akros akron edge extremity + polis city pl acropoleis Armazi (არმაზი was according to the medieval Georgian chronicles the supreme deity in a pre-Christian pantheon of ancient See also List of deities A deity is a Postulated Preternatural or Supernatural Being, who is always The name first appears in the early medieval Georgian annals though it is clearly much older and reflected in the Classical name Armastica or Harmozica of Strabo, Pliny, Ptolemy and Dio Cassius. Classical antiquity (also the classical era or classical period) is a broad term for a long period of cultural History centered on the Mediterranean Strabo ( Greek: Στράβων 63/64 BC – ca AD 24 was a Greek historian, geographer and philosopher. Gaius or Caius Plinius Secundus, ( AD 23 – August 25, AD 79 better known as Pliny the Elder, was an ancient Author Claudius Ptolemaeus ( Greek: Klaúdios Ptolemaîos; after 83 &ndash ca Lucius Cassius Dio Cocceianus ( Greek:) (c 155 or 163/164 to after 229 known in English as Cassius Dio, Dio Cassius, or Dio was According to a collection of medieval Georgian chronicles, Armaztsikhe was founded, in the 3rd century BC, by the semi-legendary king Pharnavaz I of Iberia at the place hitherto known as Kartli. Pharnavaz I (ფარნავაზი also spelled P'arnavaz P'arnawaz or Farnavaz was the first king of Kartli, an ancient Georgian kingdom known Kartli (ქართლი is the largest and most populated province of Eastern Georgia. This fortress stood on the modern-day Mount Bagineti, on the right bank of the Mtkvari River (Kura), at its confluence with the Aragvi. See Kura for other rivers called Kura Kura ( Turkish: Kura, Azerbaijani: Kür, Georgian: მტკვარი The Aragvi River and its basin is located in Georgia on the southern slope of the Caucasus Mountains. The other citadel, Tsitsamuri (წიწამური) or Sevsamora of the Classical authors, stood just opposite, on the left bank of the Aragvi and controlled the road towards Mount Kazbek. Tsitsamuri (წიწამური is a small village outside Mtskheta, Georgia. Mount Kazbek (მყინვარწვერი Mqinvartsveri) is a dormant Stratovolcano and one of the chief Mountains of the Caucasus. [1]
Even after the rise of Mtskheta as a capital of Iberia, Armazi remained the holy city of Iberian paganism and one of the defenses of Mtskheta. Paganism (from Latin paganus, meaning "country dweller rustic" is a word used to refer to various religions and religious beliefs from across the world The fortress was captured by the Roman general Pompey during his 65 BC campaign against the Iberian king Artag. Ancient Rome was a Civilization that grew out of a small agricultural community founded on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 10th century BC Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus, commonly known as Pompey /'pɑmpi/ Pompey the Great or Pompey the Triumvir ( Classical Latin abbreviation Artoces was a king of Iberia (modern-day Georgia) from 78 to 63 BC A ruined structure over the Mtkvari River dates from that time and is still called "Pompey's bridge". Armazi's heyday came when Iberia was allied with the Roman emperors. A stone stele unearthed at Armazi in 1867 reports that the Roman Emperor Vespasian fortified Armazi for the Iberian king Mithridates I in 75 AD. A stele (from Greek:, stēlē, ˈstiːli plural stelae,, stēlai, ˈstiːlaɪ also found Latinised singular stela The Roman Emperor was the ruler of the Roman State during the imperial period (starting at about 27 BC Titus Flavius Vespasianus, commonly known as Vespasian ( November 17 9 &ndash June 23 79) was a Roman Emperor who Mithridates I (Mihrdat was the 1st-century king of Iberia ( Kartli, modern eastern Georgia) whose reign is evidenced by epigraphic material [3] This defense wall constructed in a unique position to block the southern exit of the Daryal Pass before it widens into the plain of modern Tbilisi was presumably a preventive measure against the Alans who frequently raided the Roman frontiers from across the Caucasus. The Alans or Alani (occasionally but more rarely termed Alauni or Halani) were an Iranian nomadic group among the Sarmatian people
During this period, Armazi was governed by a hereditary pitiakhsh, whose rank approximated to that of viceroy or satrap, and was second in the official Iberian hierarchy after the king. A viceroy is a royal official who governs a country or province in the name of and as representative of the Monarch. See also the related deity Satrapes. Satrap (Persian ساتراپ was the name given to the governors of the Provinces of ancient The excavations of the hereditary necropolis of this dynasty yielded engraved gems bearing portraits of two of these viceroys, Asparukh (probably the contemporary of the Roman emperor Hadrian, 117-138 AD) and Zevakh (fl. 150 AD), a rare example of authentic, pre-Christian Georgian portraiture. Asparukh is a Middle Iranian Male name attested in ancient Georgia and early medieval Bulgaria. Publius Aelius Hadrianus (January 24 76 &ndash July 10 138 as emperor Imperator Caesar Divi Traiani filius Traianus Hadrianus Augustus, and Divus Hadrianus after [4] Aramaic inscriptions from Armazi mention also the royal architect and the epitropos ("Lord Chamberlain"). The Aramaic alphabet is an Abjad, a Consonantal Alphabet, used for writing Aramaic. The Lord Chamberlain or Lord Chamberlain of the Household is one of the chief officers of the Royal Household in the United Kingdom, and is to be distinguished
| Deciphered and published by Professor Giorgi Tsereteli in 1941, the Armazi bilingual epitaph runs: "I am Serapita, daughter of Zevakh the younger, pitiakhsh of Pharsman the king, and wife of Iodmandagan the victorious, winner of many conquests, master of the court of Ksefarnug, the great king of the Iberians, and son of Agrippa, master of the court of King Farsman. Giorgi Tsereteli ( გიორგი წერეთელი in Georgian. An epitaph (in Greek, &mdash literally " on the gravestone " is a short text honoring a deceased person strictly speaking that inscribed on Woe, woe, for the sake of her who was not of full age, whose yeas were not completed, and so good and beautiful that no one was like her in excellence; and she died at the age of twenty-one. "[5] |
Armazi played a central role in ancient Georgian cultural life and in the evolution of local epigraphy in Georgia, prior to the invention of the Georgian alphabet in the 4th-5th century. The Georgian alphabet (ქართული დამწერლობა is the writing system currently used to write the Georgian language and other South Caucasian Among a number of curious inscriptions found at Armazi, the most important is the bilingual Greco-Aramaic tombstone inscription commemorating the short-lived Serapita and her noble lineage. The Greek alphabet (Ελληνικό αλφάβητο is a set of twenty-four letters that has been used to write the Greek language since the late 9th or early It contains an unusual, in its ductus and some of its forms, version of the Aramaic alphabet which came to be known as the "Armazi script" although it can also be found outside Armazi, in other parts of Georgia.
With the transfer of the Georgian capital to Tbilisi in the late 5th or early 6th century, Armazi went into a gradual decline. Tbilisi (ˌtbiˈliːsi in Georgian: თბილისი is the capital and the largest city of the Republic of Georgia, lying on the banks of the Mt'k'vari It still had its own high-ranking commandant, a post held in A. D. 545 by a certain Wistam. The city was finally destroyed and razed to the ground in 736 by the Arab commander Marwan ibn Muhammad (the future Umayyad Caliph Marwan II). The araB gene Promoter is a bacterial promoter activated by e L-arabinose binding Marwan ibn Muhammad ibn Marwan or Marwan II (688-750 (Arabic مروان بن محمد بن مروان بن الحكم was an Umayyad Caliph who ruled The Caliph is the Head of state in a Caliphate, and the title for the leader of the Islamic Ummah, an Islamic community ruled by the Shari'ah [1]
The city of Armazi has never been revived since then, but a Georgian Orthodox monastery of St. Nino was constructed there between 1150 and 1178. Christianity in ancient and feudal Georgia According to tradition when the Apostles were sent out to preach the Gospel to the nations of the world the Apostle Saint Nino (წმინდა ნინო Αγία Νίνω (sometimes St This is a six-apse hall church which, as well as its associated structures, is now largely in ruins and only some fragments of the 12th-century murals have survived. A hall church is a church with Nave and side Aisles of approximately equal height often united under a single immense roof
See also
References
- ^ a b c Lang, David Marshall. Dzalisi (ძალისი is a historic village in Georgia, located in the Mukhrani valley 50 km northwest of Tbilisi, and 20 km northwest of Mtskheta David Marshall Lang ( May 6, 1924 – March 20, 1991) was a Professor of Caucasian Studies School of Oriental and "Armazi". Encyclopædia Iranica Online Edition. Encyclopædia Iranica is a project whose goal is to create a comprehensive and authoritative English language Encyclopedia about the history culture and Accessed on September 13, 2007.
- ^ Georgian Museums: National Archaeology Museum-Reserve of Greater Mtskheta. Ministry of Culture, Monuments Protection and Sports of Georgia. Accessed on September 13, 2007. Events 509 BC - The Temple of Jupiter on Rome 's Capitoline Hill is dedicated on the ides of September Year 2007 ( MMVII) was a Common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century.
- ^ Sherk, Robert K. (1988), The Roman Empire: Augustus to Hadrian, p. 128-9. Cambridge University Press, ISBN 0521338875. Cambridge University Press (known colloquially as CUP is a Publisher given a Royal Charter by Henry VIII in 1534
- ^ Lang, David Marshall. David Marshall Lang ( May 6, 1924 – March 20, 1991) was a Professor of Caucasian Studies School of Oriental and "Asparukh". Encyclopædia Iranica Online Edition. Encyclopædia Iranica is a project whose goal is to create a comprehensive and authoritative English language Encyclopedia about the history culture and Accessed on September 13, 2007. Events 509 BC - The Temple of Jupiter on Rome 's Capitoline Hill is dedicated on the ides of September Year 2007 ( MMVII) was a Common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century.
- ^ Yarshater, Ehsan (ed. , 1983), The Cambridge History of Iran, p. 525. Cambridge University Press, ISBN 052120092X. Cambridge University Press (known colloquially as CUP is a Publisher given a Royal Charter by Henry VIII in 1534
External links
- (Georgian) Historical monuments of the Mtskheta District. The Mtskheta-Mtianeti Regional Administration.
- The Bilingual Inscription from Armazi (1st century AD) (Greek and Aramaic texts with German translation) The Armazi Project. Open Society – Georgia Foundation. The Open Society Institute (OSI a private operating and grantmaking foundation aims to shape public policy to promote democratic Governance,
- Ruins on Mount Bagineti. Fund "Udabno".
- (Russian) Г. Табагуа, М. Джахуташвили. Археогеофизические исследования на территории Армазцихе-Багинети. Journal Scientists Club, 2002.
- Mt. Bagineti. Photos by Revaz Zhghenti.
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