The Martyrdom of Queen Ketevan and the Augustinian Mission to Georgia

CHAPTER NINE THE MARTYRDOM OF QUEEN KETEVAN AND THE AUGUSTINIAN MISSION TO GEORGIA Attempts by the Augustinians to found a mission to Georgia as early as 1604/5 would be frustrated by political circumstances, but their estab- lishment of a foundation at Shiraz in 1623 would prove fortuitous in this regard, allowing them to become acquainted with Queen Ketevan of the Georgian kingdom of Kakheti, imprisoned in that city by order of ‘Abbas, and they would be present at the scene of her martyrdom in the following year. This combination of circumstances would finally allow them to realise their goal of a Georgian mission, and opened another chapter in the history of the Portuguese Augustinians. Georgian Christianity and Roman Catholic Missionary Presence Like the vast majority of Georgians, Ketevan was a member of the Georgian Church, a member of the Eastern Orthodox family of Churches which accept the teachings of Chalcedon. It lays claim to apostolic foundation, although we are on firmer historical ground with the claim that St Nino of Cappadocia preached Christianity in Eastern Georgia and that it was adopted as the state religion by King (later Saint) Mirian and Queen (later Saint) Nana in 337. Conversion of the West Georgian kingdom was more gradual, with Christianity being officially embraced in 523. The Georgian Church was originally dependent on the see of Antioch, but claims autocephaly from the fifth century, led by the Catholicos Patriarch of all Georgia.1 The most detailed history of the Georgian Church remains that of Michel Tamarati (= Tamarasvili), L’Eglise Géorgienne des Origines jusqu’a nos jours (Rome, 1910). Tamarasvili was a Georgian Catholic priest whose fierce opposition to Russian annexation of the country and interference in 1 Bernard Dupuy, ‘L’Autocéphalie de l’Eglise de Géorgie’, Istina 35 (1990), 277–287; Michael Tarchnisvili, Patrick Viscuso (tr.), ‘The Origin and Development of the Ecclesiastical Autocephaly of Georgia’, Greek Orthodox Theological Review 46/1–2 (2001), 89–111. 198 chapter nine its religious affairs made it necessary for him to leave Georgia. Working in Rome he first produced a history of the Georgian Catholic Church, Istoria kat’olikobisa k’art’velt’a scioris, (Tbilisi, 1902), before publishing his schol- arly monograph on the Georgian Church. The Russian authorities clearly continued to monitor his activities even in exile: the copy of L’Eglise Géorgienne in the library of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, bears the following legend in pencil on the flyleaf, ‘All available copies were bought up by Russian Embassy in Rome. This is one of the few which escaped’. The title section of the spine has also been removed, perhaps to render the book anonymous.2 Georgian rulers had long maintained contact with European rulers, including the papacy, and relations between Rome and the ecclesiastical and political rulers of Georgia were generally positive. An exchange of letters between Queen Rusudan (1223–1245) and Honorius III and his suc- cessor Gregory IX resulted in the presence of Franciscan and Dominican missionaries in Georgia between the thirteenth and sixteenth centuries. With the Bull Rex Regum altissimus of 1328, John XXII, then in Avignon, suppressed the bishopric of Smyrna and transferred it to Tiflis. As a con- sequence of the constant turmoil affecting the country the see became a titular one, with the bishop unable to reside in Tiflis. The last of fourteen bishops of Tiflis was appointed on 29 April 1505, and it is unclear what Catholic episcopal oversight if any existed in Georgia before the country was officially placed under the jurisdiction of the Propaganda in 1633. The return of Catholic missionaries to Georgia in the seventeenth century was led by the Augustinians based in Persia, almost contemporane- ously with the appearance there of Theatines sent by the Propaganda. The Portuguese Augustinians Belchior dos Anjos and Guilherme de Santo Agostinho had first raised the possibility of establishing a mission of the Order in Georgia during the embassy of Luis Pereira de Lacerda 2 The information in Tamarati’s book may be usefully supplemented by the more recent Nodar Gabasvili, Laura Branca (ed. and tr.), La Georgia e Roma: duemila anni di dialogo (Vatican City, 2003). This continues the history of the Georgian Church into the present day, and in 119–122 the author devotes a short chapter to the life of Tamarati. A useful chronological summary of the history of Georgia and its relations with the Holy See is given in 173–181. See also Stephen H. Rapp Jr, ‘Georgian Christianity’ in Ken Parry (ed.), The Blackwell companion to Eastern Christianity (Oxford, 2007), 137–155; C. Toumanoff, ‘Introduction to Christian Caucasian History’, Traditio, 15 (1959), 1–106; Christian Caucasian History (Washington DC, 1963); ‘Christian Caucasia between Byzantium and Iran’, Traditio 10 (1954), 109–189; Michel van Esbroeck, ‘L’Eglise Géorgienne des Origines au Moyen Age’, Bedi Kartlisa 40 (1984), 186–199; id., ‘On the Historical Background of the early sources regarding the churches in the Caucasus’, St Nersess Theological Review 9 (2004), 5–24..

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