Oral Histories of the Dzegli Pilgrimage Site from Klarjeti and the Dzegli Tradition in Pshav-Khevsureti

Abstract

The chronicle of the Zhamtaaghmtsereli (the „Chronicler of the Times“) mentions the toponym Dzegli – specifically, a mountain „which is called Dzegli, upon which stands the church of Saint George, which lies [between] Opiza and Midznadzori“.

Mount Dzegli is located in Turkey, in historical Klarjeti, near Opiza. The ruins of the church are still preserved on the mountain. The memory of the local population preserves information concerning a number of ancient traditions and the beliefs and conceptions of past generations. Beside the church lies a ziareti (pilgrimage/veneration site). The ziareti and the tradition of pilgrimage associated with it are linked to the veneration of sacred places, the fulfillment of certain obligations, the offering of sacrifice, and so on.

In this tradition of pilgrimage, a clear trace of the most ancient cultures is still visible today, along with rituals transformed under conditions of religious syncretism, and an order and sequence of practices that may appear uniform across different ethnic groups, yet in which specific, distinguishing details can always be found – details shaped, over the course of centuries, within the historical, religious, and cultural epochs of one people or another.

In the mountainous region of Eastern Georgia, and particularly in Khevsureti, the word dzegli is attested, together with a tradition connected to this word. „Dzegli“ denoted a certain obligation, a vow... This obligation was connected with visiting a shrine, the performance of a certain ritual, and so on.

It may be said that, in the mountainous region of Eastern Georgia, „dzegli“ is connected both to a shrine and to an ancient ritual. On the other hand, in discussing the meaning of the Klarjetian „dzegli“ and the oral histories of the local population, it must be borne in mind that, in the Çoruh basin, the toponym is attested precisely at a former church site – a place that is, at the same time, connected with the tradition of pilgrimage veneration.

„Dzegli“, together with a number of other toponyms of the Çoruh basin, as well as the diverse narratives connected with specific places, constitutes eloquent fragments of cultural and historical information and of the collective memory of the region›s population, and offers the possibility of discussing the formation of cultural identity and its transformation over the centuries. In this case, we believe, one may speak of linguistic markers that connect a place to historical events, to traditions characteristic of a unified Georgian cultural space, and to emotional fragments of collective memory... all the more so since it is precisely such toponyms that constitute „sites of memory“ – places that sometimes bring the past to life in the present seemingly quite clearly, but which, when it comes to the Çoruh basin, must in most cases, we should probably say, be understood as doing so accompanied by symbolic associations.