Armenian News, Analysis & Photography — Oneworld Multimedia :: Excursion to Gelati and Motsameta, Imereti Region, Georgia :: March

March 15, 2007

Excursion to Gelati and Motsameta, Imereti Region, Georgia

Motsameta, Imereti Region, Republic of Georgia © Onnik Krikorian / NKTA 2007

International Women’s Day coincided with my visit last week to Kutaisi to document the work of social workers from the Ministry of Education and Science of the Republic of Georgia for the Newport Kutaisi Association. With a national holiday otherwise preventing me from visiting more institutions, I instead accompanied some of the social workers and beneficiary families to the nearby religious sites of Motsameta and Gelati, one of two UNESCO World Heritage Sites around Kutaisi.

The Gelati Monastery for a long time remained one of the main cultural and enlightening centers in old Georgia. It had an Academy which employed the most celebrated Georgian scientists - theologians and philosophers, many of whom had previously been active at various orthodox monasteries abroad or at the Mangan Academy in Constantinople. Among the scientists were such celebrated scholars as Ioann Petritsi and Arsen Ikaltoeli.

Due to the extensive enlightening work carried out by the Gelati Academy, people of the time used to call it “a new Hellas”, “a second Athos”.

The Gelati Monastery has preserved a great number of murals and manuscripts dating back to the 12th-17th centuries.

Incidentally, a word about Georgians and religion. Certainly, ritual and tradition is still pretty much a part of even young Georgians and one of the first things that strikes visitors even from Armenia is how everyone crosses themselves when passing a church, including drivers. The same is true for many people when passing religious icons in homes and schools.

Anyway, after this excursion I then went to visit some IDP families from Abkhazia, but I’ve already posted some of those photos here.