Baroness Bertha Felicitas Sophie Freifrau von Suttner, née Gräfin Kinsky von Wchinitz und Tettau (1843-1914) was an Austrian writer, activist and pacifist. In 1905 she was the first woman (and only the 7th laureate) to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
Born into a noble but impoverished family in Prague, she excelled in education, mastering several languages and becoming a talented piano player. In 1870s, she began to work as a governess to the wealthy Suttner family but soon became engaged to the Suttners' youngest son Arthur Gundaccar Freiherr von Suttner but his family bitterly opposed the marriage and forced the couple to leave. In 1876, Bertha and Arthur left Austria and moved, at the invitation of Princess Ekaterine Dadiani of Mingrelia, to Georgia, where they remained for eight years. Despite acute financial problems, the couple enjoyed their stay in Georgia and earned their living by writing novels and translations. In the 1880s, the Suttner family reconciled with the couple, allowing it to return to Austria where they settled at the Harmannsdorf Castle. Bertha became actively involved in peace and conflict issues and wrote extensively on pacifism. In 1889 she wrote Die Waffen nieder! ["Lay Down Your Arms!"], which turned her into one of the leading figures of the pacifist movement. She continued to publish and gain international repute that resulted in her receiving the Nobel Peace prize in 1905. She died of cancer in June 1914, just one week short of the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand that unleashed the World War I.
In 1910 Bertha von Suttner authorized the publication of the English edition of her memoirs, in which she devoted the entire part IV (chapters 17 through 21) to her stay in Georgia.
One afternoon, at the music, Herr von Konigswarter said to us, "The Princess of Mingrelia has a keen desire to make the acquaintance of the ladies."
We had long known who the Princess of Mingrelia was, since we saw her daily in the Kurpark and at the theater, and since Herr von Konigswarter, who was on friendly terms with her, had told us as much as he knew of the story of her life. Ekaterina Dadiani, formerly princess of the Caucasian country (now incorporated in the Russian empire) of Mingrelia, was a very elegant lady of about forty-six or forty-seven, still goodly to look upon, and must in her youth have been a dazzling beauty of the genuine Georgian type. She had for some years been living in Europe, alternately Paris and St. Petersburg, for the sake of her children's education; in summer she came regularly to drink the health-giving waters of Homburg. Every morning at seven o'clock she went to the spring; she often made the round of the gambling-rooms, but never played; at the afternoon concert she used to sit in a particular place on the Kurhaus terrace, always surrounded by a whole little court. Her family consisted of two sons and a daughter. Her oldest son Nikolaus, called Niko, was at that time seventeen years old, her daughter Salome sixteen, and her youngest son Andre fourteen. Her household (she occupied the whole ground floor of the Weckerlin house) comprised a secretary, the governess for her daughter, the tutor for the boys, a valet, and two maids.
After her husband's death she had taken the reins of government as her son's guardian. Once, hard pressed by the Turks, she herself went against the enemy at the head of her horsemen. But it had been impossible for her to hold her ground, and she had to accept the protection of Russia, a protection that was practically annexation. The heir was allowed to keep his title of Prince of Mingrelia, and his lands, but in the form of a majorat; the throne he must forego. A considerable appanage was set apart for the dowager princess, and at the Russian court she was allowed the rank of a foreign sovereign. She was content, for those Caucasian principalities and kingdoms — Georgia, Imeretia, Mingrelia, etc.— were always threatened by Mohammedan enemies, and under Russian safeguard they could develop peacefully, thrive, and remain true to their ancestral standards of life, their customs, their languages, and their dress.
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| Ekaterine Dadiani |
In the princess's company there were frequently to be seen a few Caucasian ladies wearing their picturesque home costume; she herself ordered her gowns from Worth and wore them with all the chic and elegance of a genuine grande dame. She spoke French fluently, even though it was with a strong Russian accent; with her children she conversed mostly in the Georgian language.
The desired acquaintance was made. I brought the interesting woman girlish admiration, and she took me to her heart. Soon I became almost a child of the house. At first I only sat in the great circle during the concert; then the princess invited me to accompany her to the spring in the morning, to come and see her at her apartments, to dine with her. My mother held aloof: a few formal calls made and returned, that was all. I, on the other hand, was taken into the intimacy of the princess, who had a great predilection for young people. Salome, her daughter, far nearer to me in years, came in contact with me much less than did her mother; she, with her hardly completed sixteen summers, was still rated as a child, and had to stay with her governess most of the time.
By her fellow-countrymen the princess was addressed as "Dedopali"; this means queen, literally "mother of mothers," and is in that country the correct title for every female sovereign. I was generally called by the family "la contessina." A friend of the Dadiani household, the Italian Marchese Almorini, had thus addressed me, and the designation had stuck to me. He was a comical sight, this Almorini. An old beau, always paying compliments, always skipping about, always aux petits soins with the ladies. He did not show his age: he wore a coal-black wig and dyed his beard. He could relate so many stories and chronicles of times long gone by that there had grown up a standing joke that he had been centuries in the world, like Cagliostro.
The princess's secretary, who was likewise her courier, major-domo, shawl-bearer, — in a word, factotum,— bore the name of Monsieur Ferry, and was a Frenchman. He was the picture of devotion. Since one cannot all the time be bending the upper part of the body forward as in reverential salutations, he stood with his hip sloping to one side when he spoke to his mistress, and always addressed her as "Altesse." He was a man of about forty, with a reddish imperial and side whiskers. The old valet, called Monsieur David, a fat, smooth-shaven Swiss, had been one of the household for twenty years, had served the late prince in Mingrelia, and was the genuine type of the devoted old servant, possessing the absolute confidence of his mistress and the love of her children.
Innumerable and clear-cut are the recollections which the hours that I spent in the Dedopali's house and in her company have left in my mind. The oriental, exotic quality, commingled with the Russian and Parisian tone of high society, spiced with romance and surrounded with the glitter of wealth, exercised a peculiar fascination upon me; I was truly downright happy in this relationship, it was to me like the coming true of indefinite, long-cherished dreams. When I entered her apartments in the Weckerlin house at any hour I had a glad and buoyant feeling. From the front room one entered a large dining-room with three windows and a balcony; at its right there was a corner drawing-room in which the princess spent most of her time, and back of that was her sleeping-room. At the left of the dining-room were the children's rooms. It was only an ordinary appartement meuble, though a high-grade one; nothing of princely splendor about it; but yet by the many personal objects scattered about, by the flowers, by the fashion in which the furniture was placed, the whole had a private and characteristic stamp of its own; the very odor that filled these rooms — a mixture of orange-flower perfume, Russian cigarettes, and leather—had something personal about it. In the course of years I met the Dedopali in many places, and everywhere that she stayed this same odor hovered about her rooms and adhered to all her possessions.
I spent many hours in that corner drawing-room and listened to the words of the princess, who related to me much that was romantic in her career. She would stay in Europe a few years more, and then return to her own country with her sons.
[...]
[In 1876 Bertha and Arthur decided to leave Austria and travel abroad.] Our goal was the land whither Jason went in his quest for the Golden Fleece. I think there was much of the Jason mood in us both at that time: a mingling of delight in adventure, confidence of conquest, the intoxication of hope. Before us lay a world of things new and surprising; we were going to set foot on a land consecrated by the most classical legends, and experiences which we could not even well imagine beckoned us onward.
We knew that we were expected and should be received with open arms. I had written from Vienna to the Dedopali [Ekaterine Dadiani], and to Prince Niko, who also was at that time sojourning in the Caucasus, telling our whole romance and announcing our visit. A joyous "Welcome" was wired back to us. We both thought it likely that my old friend Niko would secure for My Own [Arthur von Suttner] a position as aide to the emperor or something of the sort. And altogether we were so inordinately enraptured at being together, our bold stroke had aroused in us such an intense feeling of happiness, everything thus far had gone so sur des roulettes, that we looked forward to a constan
t increase in our good fortune. One day we should return home in triumph; but it would be a long time before we should want to return home; for the present, out into the wide, beautiful, rich, wonderful world! we were after the Golden Fleece. Nor did we need it — that was the best part. Whatever treasures the world might grant or deny us, we had in each other measureless riches. And My Own felt all this even more keenly than I. He was only twenty-six years old, and this was his first journey into the Unknown. I had already experienced so much disillusionment, and had already, with my thirty-three years, emerged in a measure from that state of intoxication which is called youth; but I caught the contagion of his youthful enthusiasm, and was as childish as he.
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| Nicholas Dadiani |
After a calm passage our steamboat landed us on the Asiatic shore. A different continent — it fills the comparatively inexperienced traveler with a peculiar pride, a pride upon which old globe-trotters look down with a smile. My Own [Arthur] set his foot on the un-European soil with the haughtiness of a conqueror. "So," said he exultingly, "here we are in Asia!" Whether Asia or Australia, whether earth or Mars, cried the exultation within me, we are together, and that is the main thing.
A messenger from the princess was on the landing place to meet us. He handed me a letter from his mistress with a renewed welcome and the request that we should delay our arrival at Gordi — the summer residence — for a week, till our hosts, who as yet were still at Zugdidi, had had time to establish themselves in their mountain abode. We were to trust ourselves to the direction of her messenger, who would conduct us to the town of Kutais, where we might put up at the hotel for the time being. So we turned the arrangements over to this factotum, a Georgian steward, who spoke a little broken French. He wore the national costume: long caftan, cartridge shells across the chest, bashlyk on head, dagger in belt.
There would not be another train for Kutais that day, hence we had to spend the night at Poti. The place had only a very simple inn, to be sure, but que faire? — This phrase, adopted from the Russian chto dyelat, often came to our ears in that country; it imports that resignation, coupled with a shrug of the shoulders, which does not so much enunciate the question what one is to do in order to contend against something as intimate rather that nothing can be done.
The inn was in truth very simple: we spent the night in chairs because the beds proved to be too thickly inhabited [by lice], and when we wanted to make our toilets and looked for a washstand there was none to be found. I rang for the chambermaid. One appeared in the form of a barefooted peasant with a scrubby beard and a forest of curly black hair. We could not make him understand what we wanted, and called to our aid our factotum, who had also put up at this palace hotel of Poti. Then it was made known to us that the house possessed only one tin wash dish, which was carried from one room to another as it was needed, and with it the towel — in what a condition !
Not especially refreshed by this resting-place, but in unruffled good spirits, we continued our journey the following morning in order to reach our next stop, Kutais, the capital of the province of the same name. There another messenger from the Mingrelian family was also awaiting us — the young prince's intendant, a portly, tumultuous Armenian, who likewise could speak broken French, and wore the European dress. He conducted us to the best inn of Kutais; this was certainly not a palace hotel either, but might be so regarded in comparison with the hole where we had been the day before, for here each guest had his own washbasin and even his own towel, and the rooms and beds were clean. But everything we saw and heard — and smelt — seemed to us so terribly exotic: the strange types of people, the strange costumes, the strange architecture of the buildings, and — as to the sense of smell — a quite peculiar and not disagreeable odor of sun-dried buffalo dung. The buffaloes themselves, which are used here to draw loads and as milch cattle, and which we had already seen idling in sundry mud-holes on our way to Kutais, were an exotic phenomenon to us.
The heat was frightful. One could hardly endure it in the rooms, and we spent our days and took our meals (consisting of mutton, mutton, mutton) on a wooden balcony which ran around the house over the court.
After two days our Armenian took his departure, and a third messenger came to be our guardian and protector. This time it was a family friend of the Dadianis, an old French nobleman de vieille roche, with the fine manners de l'ancien regime. His name was Comte de Rosmorduc. Born in Bretagne, he had come to the Caucasus some twenty-five years before (for what reason I do not know) and had settled down there for good. He had married a Mingrelian woman, and owned a house which he had himself built at Zugdidi. He was a welcome associate of the princess and her children, and later became a dear friend of ours also.
He now did us the honors of Kutais. He introduced us at the home of General Zeretelli [Tsereteli], the foremost house in the city. The Zeretellis were Caucasians and relatives of the Dadianis. They showed themselves very obliging, even arranging for a great reception in our honor on the following evening, to which all the notabilities and aristocratic families of the place were invited. The daughter, Nina, was a famous beauty, but as she was twenty-five she was regarded already as an old maid. Girls in the Caucasus usually marry at fifteen or sixteen. The Countess Rosmorduc, who was then thirty-five, had been married for twenty years. She also was a great beauty; but we did not make her acquaintance until the next year.
The soiree at the house of the Zeretellis left an ineffaceable impression on our minds, because it was the first time that we got a glimpse of the social life of the country. Here we saw ladies in their national costume and witnessed for the first time the performance of the national dance — the Lesginka. We also participated for the first time at a banquet where the fiery Kachetian wine was poured from slender silver flagons into great drinking-horns, and where a toastmaster, chosen to this honorable office, proposed the healths — on this occasion, as first of all, the health of the guests from Austria. The host and hostess did not sit down at table but helped serve. Among those present we found many who spoke French, and where that was not the case Count Rosmorduc, who had learned the language of the country, served as dragoman.
In the salon stood a piano. My husband sat down at it and played some of the waltzes which he had himself composed, and the Caucasian society was full of admiration and danced to this music with perfect grace. But they were most pleasing in the Lesginka. This dance is usually executed by only one couple, while the rest sit in a circle and clap their hands in time to the music. The accompaniment is provided by a small native instrument which endlessly repeats a certain melody three bars long, and by tambourines adorned with little bells, on which skillful hands thump with an increasingly lively rhythm. The dance itself is a pantomime of the immemorial play of love: pursuit, flight, enticement. The men perform artistic pas; the women fairly float along the floor, the long, heavy silken garment concealing the feet so that they look as if they were rolling on invisible casters; the veil which is attached to their headdress flows behind them, and from the arms, stretched out in circling gestures, float the long double sleeves.
As a conclusion to the festivity I treated the company to an Italian bravura aria and then to Auber's Laughing-Song — Carlotta Patti's show piece; the laughter in the song infected everybody, and the whole ended with a chorus of laughter.
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