GEORGIA, which the Persians call Gurgustan, and the Turks Gurtshi, contains the ancient Iberia, Colchis, and perhaps a part of Albania, since the country of Kacketi ;Kakheti], in the ancient Georgian language, was known by the name of Albon [Albania].
The inhabitants are Christians of the Greek church, and it is probable that they were called Georgians, on account of the great veneration which they entertained for St George, the tutelary saint of the country.
Georgia is divided into nine provinces, five of which are subject to Heraclius, and compose that part commonly named the kingdom of Georgia. The other four provinces are under the dominion of David, and form the kingdom, or rather principality of Immeretta [Imereti].
All these countries are in general so beautiful and fertile, that some enthusiastic travelers have imagined that the ancient garden of Eden was situated in the middle of them. The mountains are covered with oaks, chestnut and walnut-trees, birches, and an immense number of trees, of every kind, intermixed with vines, which, though little cultivated, do not fail to produce abundance of grapes. The inhabitants make as much from them as is sufficient for their annual consumption, and suffer the rest to perish. Cotton grows here without any care, and great plenty of our European fruit trees may be seen, which thrive much better than among us. Rice, hemp and flax are easily cultivated.
It is impossible to find better or more beautiful pastures - the rivers teem with fish, the mountains contain rich treasures of minerals, and the climate is pleasant and mild; in short, nature seems to have poured forth her richest gifts on this fortunate country, and to have entertained a peculiar favor for its inhabitants.
The rivers of Georgia are not proper for navigation, sometimes on account of their rapidity, occasioned by torrents which fall from the mountains and often on account of their shallowness. The navigation of the Black Sea, which might have introduced commerce and European manners into these countries being still exclusively in the possession of the Turks, the internal trade of Georgia is very much limited by the mountains of Caucasus, and this inconvenience continues daily to increase, on account of the numerous bands of plunderers who inhabit them.
[...a brief discussion of the Turkish and Persian invasion follows...]
The capital of Georgia, and the residence of prince Heraclius [King Erekle of Kartli-Kakheti] is teflis; the inhabitants call it Tyblis-Cahar or the Warm City, on account of the warm baths which are found in its neighborhood. This city was built in the year 1063 by Prince Lierang [?] according to an inscription seen on the front of the castle.
The city of Teflis is no more than two English miles in circumference; it contains 20,000 souls, the greater part of whom are Armenians, and the rest Georgians and Tartars. There are reckoned to be in this city twenty Armenian churches, fifteen Greek, and three Metscheds [mosques]. The widest streets are only seven feet in breadth, and some of them are so narrow that a man on horseback can scarcely pass along them. It may therefore be readily imagine that they are far from being clean. The houses are built with flat roofs, upon which the Georgian ladies walk to enjoy the fresh air when the weather is fine. These houses are all regular, the greater part of the walls are wainscotted [covered with wooden panels] in the inside and the floors are covered with carpets. There is an iron foundry at Teflis, in which a considerable quantity of mortars, bullets, and cannons are cast every year; but the cannon, which are all of the same calibre, are inferior to those of the Turks. The [gun-]powder made here is excellent.
The Armenians, naturally industrious, have established here the greater part of the manufactories established by their countrymen in Persia: the most flourishing of all is that of printed cottons. Teflis has a mint of its own; but besides the money which is coined there, Persian and Turkish pieces employed for purchasing honey, butter, cattle, and cloth, are also current.
The subjects of Prince Heraclius are said to amount to 60,000 families, but notwithstanding the depopulation under which the country the languishes, it is proved that the third of that number are omitted in collecting the taxes. The peasants, who are vassals to the queen, as well as those of the patriarch, pay no taxes to the prince, and are consequently not enrolled among those who pay subsidies [taxes]. The prince has permitted his sons in law, as well as his favourites, to free their vassals from every burden whatever. It is to be observed that, as the peasants are taxed by fires [hearth], and not by the head, it often happens (and this consequently tends to diminish the revenues of the sovereign) that they carry the most valuable effects of several huts into one, and burn the rest; so that they pay no tax, and the money which they thence save, enables them to acquire more. The whole population of Georgia is reckoned to be about three hundred and fifty thousand souls.
The government of Georgia is despotic, and notwithstanding this, the prince would be very much embarrassed to get his orders executed without the assistance of the Russian troops. Corporal punishments here are barbarous, but fortunately executions are rare; for criminals find it extremely easy to escape, as they are so near foreign powers; besides, the prince is sensible that it is more advantageous to confiscate the wealth of the guilty; and on that account, he is not too strict in enforcing the laws against them. Regular processes form a part of the privileges of the nobility, and are never employed except when the case is very complex, or when the power and influence of the parties are equally great, or rather when the court is afraid of embroiling itself with one of the parties. This manner of proceeding is called the judgment of God.
The Georgian dress has a great resemblance to that of the Cossacks: people of any consequence dress, however, after the Persian manner. The greater part of them dye their hair, beard, and nails red. The Georgian women rub over their hands with the same colour, and they wear a kind of bandage round their heads, from which their black hair falls over their forehead: their hair behind is formed into tresses. They paint their eye-brows black, in the form of a semi-circle, and their faces are daubed over with red and white. Their tunics are open as far as the girdle; so that when they wish to conceal their breasts, they are obliged to cover them with their hands. Their carriage is noble, their conversation easy and voluptuous, and the greater part of them can read and write, which are qualifications rarely to be met with, even among those Georgians who are of the first distinction. The Georgian women are indebted for their instruction to the cloisters in which they are educated. The greater part of the marriages here are a kind of bargains; and girls are often betrothed at the age of four or five. Women of rank never go [out] without veils, and a man would be accused of rudeness [if] he accost them in the street; the case would be the same [if] he in company inquire after the wife of another. Though this kind of etiquette seems to be in some measure a prejudice, it is excusable. The cruelties which the Persians committed against the Georgians, under the reign of Nadir Shah are still too fresh in their memory, though handed down from father to son, not to make us forgive them for being very suspicious of strangers.
Many travelers have accused the Georgians of cruelty, laziness, avarice and cowardice. These vices, which generally belong to slaves and tyrants, are abhorred in Georgia. The vassals of the colonies established by Shah Abbas at Perea, near Isphahan, as well as the inhabitants of those of the Mesendran [Mazandaran province of Iran], have gained much by their new constitution; and the Georgian cohorts, whom the Persians employed to expel the Afghans, distinguish themselves in an eminent degree by their application, good discipline, and bravery.
The other inhabitants of Georgia are Tartars, the Ossi [Ossetians] and the Armenians, whom the Georgians call Semaki [Somekhi]. The latter are dispersed throughout the whole country, sometimes mixed among the natives, and sometimes living with them in some remote village. Among their countrymen, they speak their language, but this does not prevent them from being all thoroughly acquainted with that of Georgia. They profess the Armenian religion; yet many of them follow that of the Roman Catholics. They are the most oppressed subjects of the country, but they however display great zeal and activity, for which these laborious people are eminently distinguished.
There are found also in Georgia a considerable number of Jews, called in the language of the country Seria [uria]. The greater part of these have retired to the villages, and live entirely by themselves; the rest are mixed among the Armenians and Tartars but they have never been observed to form any connections with the Ossis. The Jews pay some taxes from which the other inhabitants are exempted.
The capital of Immeretta [Imereti], where prince David resides, is called Qurtays [Kutaisi]. The remains of a church announce that [Kutaisi] was formerly a large city but at present it can scarcely be accounted a village. [King] Solomon, the father of the present sovereign, ordered the citadel to be destroyed as well as the ramparts of the city; for he thought, and very wifely, that Caucasus was the only fortification capable of being defended by an army of six thousand men undisciplined and destitute of artillery.
The number of the inhabitants of [Imereti] is reckoned to be twenty thousand families; but the greater part of them live neither in towns nor villages, but are dispersed throughout the level country, each of them possessing a small hut or cottage. These people have fewer strangers among them, and they are more engaging in their appearance than the Georgians. They are of a milder and less pusillanimous character, and the principal branch of their commerce consists in wines, a considerable quantity of which they export in skins as far as the confines of Georgia. They are acquainted with no other trade, for they are poor and miserable, and greatly oppressed by their lords.
The ordinary revenues of [Imereti], like those of Georgia, arise from a tithe which vassals are obliged to pay in wines, cattle, and corn, and some subsidies [tributes] furnished annually by neighboring princes. The extraordinary revenues for the most part arise from confiscations of every kind; but notwithstanding this, the finances of the prince are so limited that he is often under the necessity of going from house to house, to live at the expense of his vassals, never quitting their habitations until the pressing wants of his hosts absolutely compel him. It is therefore that the court of the sovereign of [Imereti] is as deficient in brilliancy as his table is in splendour when he dines at home. His principal duties consist of a certain food called gam [ghomi], which is a kind of millet boiled, and a piece of roast meat, with some high seasoned sauce. He never eats but with his fingers, for forks and spoons are unknown in [Imereti]. At table, he generally gives audiences respecting affairs of the first consequence, which he determines as he thinks proper; for in every country subject to his dominions, there is no other law but his will.
On Friday, which is the market day, all his new edicts are published by a kind of herald, who climbs up into some tree, in order to proclaim the will of his sovereign. The [Imeretians] profess the religion of the Greek church. Their patriarch must be of the royal family; but it is seldom that he can either read or write: the priests who compose the rest of the clergy are not much more enlightened. The greater part of their churches are pitiful edifices, which can scarcely be distinguished from the common huts of the inhabitants but by a pasteboard crucifix, and a few coarse paintings of the Virgin, which are seen in them.
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