ECG034. Urbnisi Sioni church, restoration inscription of Bishop Theodoros

Material: Limestone

Object type: Facade

Dimensions: w 52 x h 138 x d 41 cm w 48 x h 41 cm

Text: Six line inscription. The inscription is located on top of the south facade door of the church, on the neighbouring rectangular plaques of grey color sandstone. Each of the lines start on the left plaque and finish on the right plaque. w 90,5 x h 39 cm

Letters: Engraved Asomtavruli inscription 5,5-6

Date: X AD (lettering)

Findspot: Urbnisi Sioni

Original location: Urbnisi Sioni

Last recorded location(s): Urbnisi Sioni

Text type:Unknown

Editor(s): Nodar Shoshiashvili

Changes history:2019-11-11 Eka Kvirkvelia ტექსტის სრული კოდირება, მეტამონაცემების სრული კოდირება, ბმულებით დაკავშირება ავტორიტეტულ წყაროსთან

Publication details:ილიას სახელმწიფო უნივერსიტეტი, ლინგვისტურ კვლევათა ინსტიტუტი; Ilia State University, Institute of Linguistic Studies; დოკუმენტი ვრცელდება Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 ლიცენზიით.

Translation

God Lord, have mercy on Bishop Theodoros son of Luke, builder of this Sioni church. When God blessed me for becoming a bishop of this church, the church was extremely damaged. All of the four sides and vaults were cracked, the columns of the attic were decayed. And the god gave me the honor to build and repair all of these. I accomplished everything with the power of Sioni and the mercy of God.

Commentary

According to the Corpus of Georgian Inscriptions by Nodar Shoshiashvili the inscription #104. Parmen Zakaraia dated the inscription to the IX-X centuries. The lines are separated from each other by horizontal embossed parallel lines. Except the 5th and 6th lines (it seems that there was no space left for the embossed line: the last line of the inscription would not fit in that case. For the same reason the last line of the inscription does not start from the edge of the plaque but from the third letter of the upper line). Thus, the left plaque has four dividing embossed lines and the right plaque has five. The distance between the lines is 6-6,5 cm. The inscription does not contain any mark of separation or abbreviation. No spaces between the words. The date of the inscription is based on the paleographic data: Ⴃ without a neck, square shape of the graphemes, tendency to the Nuskhuri alphabet: Ⴚ, Ⴊ, Ⴋ, Ⴌ. The grapheme Ⴇ has a tendency to the Mkhedruli alphabet.

Bibliography

შოშიაშვილი, 1980 ნოდარ შოშიაშვილი, ქართული წარწერების კორპუსი, 196-197

ბროსე, 1851 M. Brosset, Rapports VI, 13-14

თაყაიშვილი, 1907 ექვთიმე თაყაიშვილი, არხეოლოგიური მოგზაურობანი და შენიშვნანი, 43

შოშიაშვილი, 1958 ნოდარ შოშიაშვილი, ნაქალაქარი ურბნისი, 138-139

შოშიაშვილი, 1965 ნოდარ შოშიაშვილი, ურბნისის ძველი ქართული წარწერები, 146-147

სილოგავა, 1970 ვალერი სილოგავა, ეპიგრაფიკული ეტიუდები, 93

ზაქარაია, 1965 პარმენ ზაქარაია, ნაქალაქარ ურბნისის ხუროთმოძღვრება

Images

   Fig. 1.