About Svaneti

Located in the north-west of Georgia, between the Great Caucasus Range and the Svaneti Range, Svaneti is the highest inhabited area in the Caucasus. It consists of small villages forming communities with the regional centre in Mestia. Svans are the indigenous population: a distinct sub-ethnic group of the Georgians speaking the Svan language with a history and culture that date back to the Bronze Age and probably even much earlier. The ancestors of present-day Svans were Colchians – early Kartvelian-speaking tribes, a population native to Colchis, an independent kingdom (13th – 1st centuries BC) which is regarded as an early ethnically Georgian polity. The famous Greek geographer and historian Strabo mentions the Svans (whom he calls Soanes, which is closer to the actual pronunciation) in his Geographica (7 BC) as the most brave and strong tribe among the Georgian tribes of Colchis.

Christianity came to Svaneti in 4th – 6th centuries, was eagerly accepted by the Svans, integrating and redefining the previous spiritual culture. In fact, instead of casting away the ancient texts, songs, rituals, festivals and even the ancient names of local divinities, they conserved the ancient lore within the Christian tradition of Svaneti.​ The adoption of Christianity created a fertile soil for a further evolution of Svaneti culture and civilization, the pitch of this evolution being in the 9th -15th centuries. The outstanding architectural monuments of this period (stone churches, tower houses and defensive towers, castles) are included in the UNESCO World Heritage Sites list. Starting from the 9th century, stone churches were built and their walls were then richly decorated with frescoes. Svaneti nobles invited famous painters from outside Svaneti, including the King’s painter Tevdore in the 11th century, to decorate their family churches.

At the same time, a distinct Svaneti school of iconography and mural painting was formed during the “golden age”, in the 10th -12th centuries, producing masterpieces of Christian art.

Svaneti craftsmen were skillful gold and silversmiths since the ancient times of Colchis, due to locally sourced gold and silver, and starting from the 10th century hammered silver icons of unique beauty and technical perfection appear, along with alter crosses, chalices, jewellery and other items. Curiously, it is traditionally men that make men’s jewellery and women that make women’s jewellery in Svaneti.

One of the most ancient and popular crafts of Svaneti is wood and bone carving. Every family has traditional pieces of furniture, woodenware such as plates, cups, knives, etc made by the men of the family. The fact that objects of everyday use in Svaneti were mostly made by local craftsmen indicate that traditional crafts were highly developed. The interior of the traditional Svaneti house, machubi, is covered with carved wooden panels with a symbolic ornament. Visit the “Margiani machubi” in Mestia or the Ethnographic museum in Ushguli to see an authentic interior. All of the churches have wooden doors, elaborately decorated with Gospel and historic scenes, floral and geometrical ornaments.​

Besides the rich church-art heritage of its own, Svaneti has become the storage place for many valuable items brought to this isolated region for safekeeping during the many invasions of Georgia over the centuries, and a significant number of them remain in churches and private homes today. Well protected by the mountains, the harsh climate and its fierce warriors, the region has never been occupied by foreign invaders who could have plundered or destroyed its treasures.

​The communities (and now partly Mestia Museum of History and Ethnography, which is definitely worth a visit, being in the TOP 10 European museums) still keep medieval illustrated manuscripts of the New Testament of 11th – 14th  centuries, such as the Gospels of Kurashi, Lakhamula, Lakhushdi, Mestia, etc – some of them brought to Svaneti from other parts of Georgia in the Middle Ages, and some produced locally.