The Issue Of “the Georgians Exile” In The Book “the Georgians In Persia” By Zakaria Chichinadze

Abstract

Since the 90s of the XIX century we rarely meet the author, who works on the issue of Georgians living in Persia and without a book by Zakaria Chichinadze “Georgians in Persia and Atam Onikashvili (1895.), a Persian Georgian who has come in Georgia”. The book currently represents bibliographical rarity. Though Lado Aghniashvili, the first Georgian traveler in Fereydan considers suspicious some of the facts from the above mentioned book, which is the first work published in the 19th century about the exile of Georgians not only in Persia but also in other countries.

Zakaria Chichinadze, as a sympathetic patriot, tries to show the tragedy that befell the Georgians for centuries by migration-voluntarily or by force. He allocates the reasons and points out that the authors of “Kartlis Tskhovreba” (The Kartli Life) are somehow silent about the issue. Zakaria Chichinadze tries to bring the sources on which he relied while working on his book. In addition, he used the information published in Armenian newspapers of that time about the Armenian tradesmen’s travelling impressions.

We consider that the book by Zakaria Chichinadze is important not only from the historical point but also it is important even nowadays as the process of emigration of the Georgians became so frequent. In the presented article we tried to highlight the importance of the book.