05-21-2023-0054 - Georgian Era, Georgian Script, Georgian (indigenous Caucasian Ethnic Group), Unicode block [Georgian (Unicode block)], 1714 and 1837, Georgian_architecture, etc. (draft)

Georgian

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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Look up Georgian in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Georgian may refer to:

Common meanings

• Anything related to, or originating from Georgia (country)
  • Georgians, an indigenous Caucasian ethnic group
  • Georgian language, a Kartvelian language spoken by Georgians
  • Georgian scripts, three scripts used to write the language
  • Georgian (Unicode block), a Unicode block containing the Mkhedruli and Asomtavruli scripts
  • Georgian cuisine, cooking styles and dishes with origins in the nation of Georgia and prepared by Georgian people around the world
• Someone from Georgia (U.S. state)
• Georgian era, a period of British history (1714–1837)
  • Georgian architecture, the set of architectural styles current between 1714 and 1837

Places

• Georgian Bay, a bay of Lake Huron
• Georgian Cliff, a cliff on Alexander Island, Antarctica

Airlines

• Georgian Airways, an airline based in Tbilisi, Georgia
• Georgian International Airlines, an airline based in Tbilisi, Georgia
• Air Georgian, an airline based in Ontario, Canada
• Sky Georgia, an airline based in Tbilisi, Georgia

Schools

• Georgian College, in Barrie, Ontario, Canada
• Georgian International Academy, a research and academic institution in Tbilisi, Georgia
• Georgian Technical University, a technical university in Tbilisi, Georgia

Arts and entertainment

• The Georgians (Frank Guarente), an American jazz and dance band of the 1920s
• The Georgians (Nat Gonella), a British jazz band of the 1930s
• Georgian poets, a group of early 20th century English poets
• Georgian Theatre Royal, a theatre and playhouse in Richmond, North Yorkshire, UK

People

• Georgian Păun (born 1985), Romanian footballer
• Georgian Popescu (born 1984), Romanian amateur boxer
• Georgian Tobă (born 1989), Romanian footballer

Other uses

• Atlanta Georgian, a defunct Hearst-owned newspaper
• Augusta Georgians, an American minor league baseball team from 1920 to 1921
• Georgian Mall, a mall in Barrie, Ontario, Canada
• Georgian (train), a Chicago-to-Atlanta passenger train route

See also

• Georgia (disambiguation)
• All pages with titles beginning with Georgian
• All pages with titles containing Georgian

This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the title Georgian.
If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article.

Categories:

• Disambiguation pages
• Disambiguation pages with given-name-holder lists
• Romanian masculine given names

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgian

Georgians

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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Georgians
ქართველები
Kartvelebi

The Georgian kings, queens consort and the Catholicos-Patriarch depicted on a Byzantine-influenced fresco[a] wearing Byzantine dress at the Gelati Monastery, UNESCO's World Heritage Site landmark.[3]
Total population
c. 4 million[b]
Regions with significant populations
Georgia 3,224,600[4][c] For more, see list of population and statistical data
Languages
Georgian and other Kartvelian languages
Religion
Predominant: Georgian Orthodoxy[5] Significant: Catholicism and Islam[6]

This article is about the Caucasian ethnic group. For the inhabitants of Georgia, see Demographics of Georgia (country). For the inhabitants of the US state, see Demographics of Georgia (U.S. state). For other uses, see Georgian (disambiguation).

The Georgians, or Kartvelians (/kɑːrtˈvɛliənz/; Georgian: ქართველები, romanized: kartvelebi, pronounced [kʰɑɾtʰvɛlɛbi]), are a nation and indigenous Caucasian ethnic group native to Georgia and the South Caucasus. Georgian diaspora communities are also present throughout Russia, Turkey, Greece, Iran, Ukraine, United States, and European Union.

Georgians arose from Colchian and Iberian civilizations of classical antiquity; Colchis was interconnected with the Hellenic world, whereas Iberia was influenced by the Achaemenid Empire until Alexander the Great conquered it.^[7] In the 4th century, the Georgians became one of the first to embrace Christianity and now the majority of Georgians are Orthodox Christians, with most following their national autocephalous Georgian Orthodox Church,^[8][9] although there are small Georgian Catholic and Muslim communities as well as a significant number of irreligious Georgians. Located in the Caucasus, on the continental crossroads of Europe and Asia, the High Middle Ages saw Georgian people form a unified Kingdom of Georgia in 1008 AD,^[10][11][12] the pan-Caucasian empire,^[13] later inaugurating the Georgian Golden Age, a height of political and cultural power of the nation. This lasted until the kingdom was weakened and later disintegrated as the result of the 13th–15th-century invasions of the Mongols and Timur,^[14] the Black Death, the Fall of Constantinople, as well as internal divisions following the death of George V the Brilliant in 1346, the last of the great kings of Georgia.^[15]

Thereafter and throughout the early modern period, Georgians became politically fractured and were dominated by the Ottoman Empire and successive dynasties of Iran. Georgians started looking for allies and found the Russians on the political horizon as a possible replacement for the lost Byzantine Empire, "for the sake of the Christian faith".^[16] The Georgian kings and Russian tsars exchanged no less than 17 embassies,^[17] which culminated in 1783, when Heraclius II of the eastern Georgian kingdom of Kartli-Kakheti forged an alliance with the Russian Empire. The Russo-Georgian alliance, however, backfired as Russia was unwilling to fulfill the terms of the treaty, proceeding to annex^[18][19] the troubled kingdom in 1801^[20] as well as the western Georgian kingdom of Imereti in 1810.^[21] There were several uprisings and movements to restore the statehood, the most notable being the 1832 plot, which collapsed in failure.^[22] Eventually, Russian rule over Georgia was acknowledged in various peace treaties with Iran and the Ottomans, and the remaining Georgian territories were absorbed by the Russian Empire in a piecemeal fashion through the course of the 19th century. Georgians briefly reasserted their independence from Russia under the First Georgian Republic from 1918 to 1921 and finally in 1991 from the Soviet Union.

The Georgian nation was formed out of a diverse set of geographic subgroups, each with its characteristic traditions, manners, dialects and, in the case of Svans and Mingrelians, own regional languages. The Georgian language, with its own unique writing system and extensive written tradition, which goes back to the 5th century, is the official language of Georgia as well as the language of education of all Georgians living in the country. According to the State Ministry on Diaspora Issues of Georgia, unofficial statistics say that there are more than 5 million Georgians in the world.^[23]

Etymology

The term "Georgian" resulted from the merger of Persian designation "gurg" (wolf), with the cult of Saint George popular among the Georgians, whether pagan or Christian.^[24] Even though the nation's designation does not derive from the Christian martyr, the saint's name (George) played a definite role in the transformation of the oriental ethnonym "gurg/gorg" into "Georgia/Georgian".^[25]

Further information: Names of the Georgians

Georgians call themselves Kartvelebi (ქართველები), their land Sakartvelo (საქართველო), and their language Kartuli (ქართული).^[26][27] According to The Georgian Chronicles, the ancestor of the Kartvelian people was Kartlos, the great-grandson of the Biblical Japheth. However, scholars agree that the word is derived from the Karts, the latter being one of the proto-Georgian tribes that emerged as a dominant group in ancient times.^[28] Kart probably is cognate with Indo-European gard and denotes people who live in a "fortified citadel".^[29] Ancient Greeks (Homer, Herodotus, Strabo, Plutarch etc.) and Romans (Titus Livius, Cornelius Tacitus, etc.) referred to western Georgians as Colchians and eastern Georgians as Iberians.^[30]

The term "Georgians" is derived from the country of Georgia. In the past, lore-based theories were given by the medieval French traveller Jacques de Vitry, who explained the name's origin by the popularity of St. George amongst Georgians,^[31] while traveller Jean Chardin thought that "Georgia" came from Greek γεωργός ("tiller of the land"), as when the Greeks came into the region (in Colchis^[28]) they encountered a developed agricultural society.^[28]

However, as Prof. Alexander Mikaberidze adds, these explanations for the word Georgians/Georgia are rejected by the scholarly community, who point to the Persian word gurğ/gurğān ("wolf"^[32]) as the root of the word.^[33] Starting with the Persian word gurğ/gurğān, the word was later adopted in numerous other languages, including Slavic and West European languages.^[28][34] This term itself might have been established through the ancient Iranian appellation of the near-Caspian region, which was referred to as Gorgan ("land of the wolves"^[35]).^[28]

Anthropology

Further information: Caucasian race

The 18th-century German professor of medicine and member of the British Royal Society Johann Friedrich Blumenbach, widely regarded as one of the founders of the discipline of anthropology and the obsolete and disproven theory of biological race,^[36] regarded Georgians as the most beautiful race of people.

Caucasian variety – I have taken the name of this variety from Mount Caucasus, both because its neighborhood, and especially its southern slope, produces the most beautiful race of men, I mean the Georgian; and because all physiological reasons converge to this, that in that region, if anywhere, it seems we ought with the greatest probability to place the autochthones (original members) of mankind.^[37]

History

A Georgian, by Cesare Vecellio.

Further information: History of Georgia (country) and Prehistoric Georgia

Most historians and scholars of Georgia as well as anthropologists, archaeologists, and linguists tend to agree that the ancestors of modern Georgians inhabited the southern Caucasus and northern Anatolia since the Neolithic period.^[38] Scholars usually refer to them as Proto-Kartvelian (Proto-Georgians such as Colchians and Iberians) tribes.^[39]

The Georgian people in antiquity have been known to the ancient Greeks and Romans as Colchians and Iberians.^[40][41] East Georgian tribes of Tibarenians-Iberians formed their kingdom in 7th century BCE. However, western Georgian tribes (Colchian tribes) established the first Georgian state of Colchis (circa 1350 BCE) before the foundation of the Kingdom of Iberia in the east.^[42][43] According to the numerous scholars of Georgia, the formations of these two early Georgian kingdoms of Colchis and Iberia, resulted in the consolidation and uniformity of the Georgian nation.^[44]

According to the renowned scholar of the Caucasian studies Cyril Toumanoff, the Moschians also were one of the early proto-Georgian tribes which were integrated into the first early Georgian state of Iberia.^[43] The ancient Jewish chronicle by Josephus mentions Georgians as Iberes who were also called Thobel (Tubal).^[45] David Marshall Lang argued that the root Tibar gave rise to the form Iber that made the Greeks pick up the name Iberian in the end for the designation of the eastern Georgians.^[46]

Georgians presenting gifts to the Byzantine emperor. The Skylitzes Chronicle.

Diauehi in Assyrian sources and Taochi in Greek lived in the northeastern part of Anatolia. This ancient tribe is considered by many scholars as ancestors of the Georgians.^[47] Modern Georgians still refer to this region, which now belongs to present-day Turkey, as Tao-Klarjeti, an ancient Georgian kingdom. Some people there still speak the Georgian language.^[48]

Colchians in the ancient western Georgian polity of Colchis were another proto-Georgian tribe. They are first mentioned in the Assyrian annals of Tiglath-Pileser I and in the annals of Urartian king Sarduri II, and also included western Georgian tribe of the Meskhetians.^[43][49]

Iberians, also known as Tiberians or Tiberanians, lived in the eastern Georgian kingdom of Iberia.^[43]

Both Colchians and Iberians played an important role in the ethnic and cultural formation of the modern Georgian nation.^[50][51]

According to the scholar of the Caucasian studies Cyril Toumanoff:

Colchis appears as the first Caucasian State to have achieved the coalescence of the newcomer, Colchis can be justly regarded as not a proto-Georgian, but a Georgian (West Georgian) kingdom ... It would seem natural to seek the beginnings of Georgian social history in Colchis, the earliest Georgian formation.^[52]

Genetics

Further information: Genetic history of the Caucasus

An FTDNA collection of Georgian Y-DNA suggests that Georgians have the highest percentage of Haplogroup G (39.9%) among the general population recorded in any country. Georgians' Y-DNA also belongs to Haplogroup J (32.5%), R1b (8.6%), L (5.4%), R1a (4.2%), I2 (3.8%) and other more minor haplogroups such as E, T and Q.^[53]

Culture

Georgian language is written in its own unique alphabet since the 5th century.

Main article: Culture of Georgia (country)

Language and linguistic subdivisions

Main article: Georgian language

Georgian is the primary language for Georgians of all provenance, including those who speak other Kartvelian languages: Svans, Mingrelians and the Laz. The language known today as Georgian is a traditional language of the eastern part of the country which has spread to most of the present-day Georgia after the post-Christianization centralization in the first millennium CE. Today, Georgians regardless of their ancestral region use Georgian as their official language. The regional languages Svan and Mingrelian are languages of the west that were traditionally spoken in the pre-Christian Kingdom of Colchis, but later lost importance as the unified Kingdom of Georgia emerged. Their decline is largely due to the capital of the unified kingdom, Tbilisi, being in the eastern part of the country known as Kingdom of Iberia effectively making the language of the east an official language of the Georgian monarch.

All of these languages comprise the Kartvelian language family along with the related language of the Laz people, which has speakers in both Turkey and Georgia.

Georgian dialects include Imeretian, Racha-Lechkhumian, Gurian, Adjarian, Imerkhevian (in Turkey), Kartlian, Kakhetian, Ingilo (in Azerbaijan), Tush, Khevsur, Mokhevian, Pshavian, Fereydan dialect in Iran in Fereydunshahr and Fereydan, Mtiuletian, Meskhetian and Javakhetian dialect.

Religion

Jvari Monastery, one of the oldest churches in Georgia, located in country's ancient capital city of Mtskheta.

Main articles: Religion in Georgia (country) and Secularism and irreligion in Georgia

According to Orthodox tradition, Christianity was first preached in Georgia by the Apostles Simon and Andrew in the 1st century. It became the state religion of Kartli (Iberia) in 337.^[54][55] At the same time, in the first centuries A.D., the cult of Mithras, pagan beliefs, and Zoroastrianism were commonly practiced in Georgia.^[56] The conversion of Kartli to Christianity is credited to St. Nino of Cappadocia. Christianity gradually replaced all the former religions except Zoroastrianism, which become a second established religion in Iberia after the Peace of Acilisene in 378.^[57] The conversion to Christianity eventually placed the Georgians permanently on the front line of conflict between the Islamic and Christian world. Georgians remained mostly Christian despite repeated invasions by Muslim powers, and long episodes of foreign domination.

As was true elsewhere, the Christian church in Georgia was crucial to the development of a written language, and most of the earliest written works were religious texts. Medieval Georgian culture was greatly influenced by Eastern Orthodoxy and the Georgian Orthodox Church, which promoted and often sponsored the creation of many works of religious devotion. These included churches and monasteries, works of art such as icons, and hagiographies of Georgian saints.

Today, 83.9% of the Georgian population, most of whom are ethnic Georgian, follow Eastern Orthodox Christianity.^[58] A sizable Georgian Muslim population exists in Adjara. This autonomous Republic borders Turkey, and was part of the Ottoman Empire for a longer amount of time than other parts of the country. Those Georgian Muslims practice the Sunni Hanafi form of Islam. Islam has however declined in Adjara during the 20th century, due to Soviet anti-religious policies, cultural integration with the national Orthodox majority, and strong missionary efforts by the Georgian Orthodox Church.^[59] Islam remains a dominant identity only in the eastern, rural parts of the Republic. In the early modern period, converted Georgian recruits were often used by the Persian and Ottoman Empires for elite military units such as the Mameluks, Qizilbash, and ghulams. The Georgians in Iran are all reportedly Shia Muslims today, while the Georgian minority in Turkey are mostly Sunni Muslim.

There is also a small number of Georgian Jews, tracing their ancestors to the Babylonian captivity.

In addition to traditional religious confessions, Georgia retains irreligious segments of society, as well as a significant portion of nominally religious individuals who do not actively practice their faith.^[60]

Cuisine

Georgian Tamada making a toast at Supra, by Niko Pirosmani.

The Georgian cuisine is specific to the country, but also contains some influences from other European culinary traditions, as well as those from the surrounding Western Asia. Each historical province of Georgia has its own distinct culinary tradition, such as Megrelian, Kakhetian, and Imeretian cuisines. In addition to various meat dishes, Georgian cuisine also offers a variety of vegetarian meals.

The importance of both food and drink to Georgian culture is best observed during a Caucasian feast, or supra, when a huge assortment of dishes is prepared, always accompanied by large amounts of wine, and dinner can last for hours. In a Georgian feast, the role of the tamada (toastmaster) is an important and honoured position.

In countries of the former Soviet Union, Georgian food is popular due to the immigration of Georgians to other Soviet republics, in particular Russia. In Russia all major cities have many Georgian restaurants and Russian restaurants often feature Georgian food items on their menu.^[61]

Geographic subdivisions and subethnic groups

Svan peasant in Mestia, c. 1888

Geographical subdivisions

The Georgians have historically been classified into various subgroups based on the geographic region which their ancestors traditionally inhabited.

Even if a member of any of these subgroups moves to a different region, they will still be known by the name of their ancestral region. For example, if a Gurian moves to Tbilisi (part of the Kartli region) he will not automatically identify himself as Kartlian despite actually living in Kartli. This may, however, change if substantial amount of time passes. For example, there are some Mingrelians who have lived in the Imereti region for centuries and are now identified as Imeretian or Imeretian-Mingrelians.

Main article: Georgian surname

Last names from mountainous eastern Georgian provinces (such as Kakheti, etc.) can be distinguished by the suffix –uri (ური), or –uli (ული). Most Svan last names typically end in –ani (ანი), Mingrelian in –ia (ია), -ua (უა), or -ava (ავა), and Laz in –shi (ში).

Name	Name in Georgian	Geographical region	Dialect or Language
Adjarians	აჭარელი achareli	Adjara	Adjarian dialect
Gurians	გურული guruli	Guria	Gurian dialect
Imeretians	იმერელი imereli	Imereti	Imeretian dialect
Javakhians	ჯავახი javakhi	Javakheti	Javakhian dialect
Kakhetians	კახელი kakheli	Kakheti	Kakhetian dialect
Kartlians	ქართლელი kartleli	Kartli	Kartlian dialect
Khevsurians	ხევსური khevsuri	Khevsureti	Khevsurian dialect
Lechkhumians	ლეჩხუმელი lechkhumeli	Lechkhumi	Lechkhumian dialect
Mingrelians	მეგრელი megreli	Samegrelo	Mingrelian language
Meskhetians	მესხი meskhi	Meskheti (Samtskhe)	Meskhian dialect
Mokhevians	მოხევე mokheve	Khevi	Mokhevian dialect
Pshavians	ფშაველი pshaveli	Pshavi	Pshavian dialect
Rachians	რაჭველი rachveli	Racha	Rachian dialect
Svans	სვანი svani	Svaneti	Svan language
Tushs	თუში tushi	Tusheti	Tushetian dialect

The 1897 Russian census (which accounted people by language), had Imeretian, Svan and Mingrelian languages separate from Georgian.^[62] During the 1926 Soviet census, Svans and Mingrelians were accounted separately from Georgian.^[63] Svan and Mingrelian languages are both Kartvelian languages and are closely related to the national Georgian language.

Outside modern Georgia

Main article: Georgian diaspora

Laz people also may be considered Georgian based on their geographic location and religion. According to the London School of Economics' anthropologist Mathijs Pelkmans,^[64] Lazs residing in Georgia frequently identify themselves as "first-class Georgians" to show pride, while considering their Muslim counterparts in Turkey as "Turkified Lazs".^[65]

Subethnic groups	Georgian name	Settlement area	Language (dialect)	Number	Difference(s) from mainstream Georgians (other than location)
Laz people	ლაზი lazi	Chaneti (Turkey)	Laz language	1 million	Religion: Muslim majority, Orthodox Minority
Fereydani	ფერეიდნელი pereidneli	Fereydan (Iran)	Pereidnuli dialect	100,000 +[6]	Religion: Muslim[6]
Chveneburi	ჩვენებური chveneburi	Black Sea Region (Turkey)	Georgian language	91,000[66]–1,000,000[67]	Religion: Muslim[66]
Ingiloy people	ინგილო ingilo	Saingilo Hereti Zaqatala District (Azerbaijan)	Ingiloan dialect	12,000	Religion: Muslim majority,[68] Orthodox minority[69]
Imerkhevians (Shavshians)	შავში shavshi	Shavsheti (Turkey)	Imerkhevian dialect		Religion: Muslim majority.
Klarjians	კლარჯი klarji	Klarjeti (Turkey)	Imerkhevian dialect

Extinct Georgian subdivisions

Throughout history Georgia also has extinct Georgian subdivisions

Name	Name in Georgian	Geographical location	Dialect or language
Dvals	დვალი dvali	Georgia (Racha and Khevi regions) and Russia (North Ossetia)	Dval dialect

See also

• Georgia (country) portal

• List of Georgians
• Demographics of Georgia (country)
• Georgian American
• Peoples of the Caucasus

References

1. 
   

The fresco was a demonstration of the ambitious imperial^[1] example on which the Georgian rulers modeled themselves and competed in magnificence with those of Constantinople.^[2]

The total figure is merely an estimation; sum of all the referenced populations only.

3. Ethnic Georgians are 86.8% of Georgia's current population of 3,713,800. Data without the occupied territories of Georgia.

1. 
   

Rapp (2016), location: 8958

Eastmond, pp. 26-61-62

Eastmond, pp. 60-28

Census data of National Statistics Office of Georgia

"საქართველოს მოსახლეობის საყოველთაო აღწერის საბოლოო შედეგები" (PDF). National Statistics Office of Georgia. 28 April 2016. Archived from the original (PDF) on 10 October 2017. Retrieved 29 April 2016.

Rezvani, Babak (Winter 2009). "The Fereydani Georgian Representation". Anthropology of the Middle East. 4 (2): 52–74. doi:10.3167/ame.2009.040205.

Rayfield, pp. 18—19

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Suny, p. 32

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W.E.D. Allen, location: 1157

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W.E.D. Allen, location: 344

Suny, pp. 63-65-88

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Suny, pp. 64-66

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Statistics Archived 13 August 2020 at the Wayback Machine 22.04.2015

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Khintibidze, Elguja (1998), The Designations of the Georgians and Their Etymology, pp. 77-78, Tbilisi State University Press, ISBN 5-511-00775-7

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Braund, David. Georgia in Antiquity: A History of Colchis and Transcaucasian Iberia, 550 BC-AD 562, pp. 17–18

Peradze, Gregory. "The Pilgrims' derivation of the name Georgia". Georgica, Autumn, 1937, nos. 4 & 5, 208–209

Hock, Hans Henrich; Zgusta, Ladislav (1997). Historical, Indo-European, and Lexicographical Studies. Walter de Gruyter. p. 211. ISBN 978-3110128840.

Mikaberidze, Alexander (2015). Historical Dictionary of Georgia (2 ed.). Rowman & Littlefield. p. 3. ISBN 978-1442241466. However, such explanations are rejected by the scholarly community, who point to the Persian gurğ/gurğān as the root of the word (...)

Boeder; et al. (2002). Philology, typology and language structure. Peter Lang. p. 65. ISBN 978-0820459912. The Russian designation of Georgia (Gruziya) also derives from the Persian gurg.

Rapp (2016), location: 1086

Wagner, Jennifer K.; Yu, Joon-Ho; Ifekwunigwe, Jayne O.; Harrell, Tanya M.; Bamshad, Michael J.; Royal, Charmaine D. (February 2017). "Anthropologists' views on race, ancestry, and genetics: WAGNER et al". American Journal of Physical Anthropology. 162 (2): 318–327. doi:10.1002/ajpa.23120. PMC 5299519. PMID 27874171.

Blumenbach, De generis humani varietate nativa (3rd ed. 1795), trans. Thomas Bendyshe (1865). Quoted e.g. in Arthur Keith, '"Blumenbach's Centenary", Man (journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland), v. 40, pp. 82–85 (1940).

Lang, p. 19

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Georgia A Sovereign Country of the Caucasus, Roger Rosen, p 18

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The Complete Works, Jewish Antiquities, Josephus, Book 1, p 57

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Suny, p. 6

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Lang, p. 59

Charles Burney and David Marshal Lang, The Peoples of the Hills: Ancient Ararat and Caucasus, p. 38

Toumanoff, p. 57

Toumanoff, pp. 69—84

"FamilyTreeDNA - Georgian DNA Project". www.familytreedna.com. Retrieved 19 December 2022.

Toumanoff, Cyril, "Iberia between Chosroid and Bagratid Rule", in Studies in Christian Caucasian History, Georgetown, 1963, pp. 374–377. Accessible online at "Iberia between Chosroid and Bagratid Rule by Cyril Toumanoff. Eastern Asia Minor, Georgia, Georgian History, Armenia, Armenian History". Archived from the original on 8 February 2012. Retrieved 4 June 2012.

Rapp, Stephen H., Jr (2007). "7 – Georgian Christianity". The Blackwell Companion to Eastern Christianity. John Wiley & Sons. p. 138. ISBN 978-1-4443-3361-9. Retrieved 11 May 2012.

"GEORGIA iii. Iranian elements in Georgian art and archeology". Retrieved 1 January 2015.

Suny, Ronald Grigor (1994). The Making of the Georgian Nation. ISBN 0253209153. Retrieved 2 January 2015.

"2002 census results – p. 132" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 23 October 2015. Retrieved 4 June 2012.

Thomas Liles, "Islam and religious transformation in Adjara", ECMI Working Paper, February 2012, [1] Archived 5 November 2015 at the Wayback Machine, accessed 4 June 2012

Caucasus Analytical Digest No.20, Heinrich Böll Stiftung, 11 October 2010

Mack, Glenn R.; Surina, Asele (2005). Food Culture in Russia And Central Asia. Greenwood Publishing Group. ISBN 0-313-32773-4.

(in Russian) Первая всеобщая перепись населения Российской Империи 1897 г.

(in Russian) ССР ГРУЗИЯ (1926 г.)

"Dr Mathijs Pelkmans". Retrieved 21 August 2015.

Pelkmans, Mathijs. Defending the border: identity, religion, and modernity in the Republic of Georgia. Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press, 2006, pg. 80

Extra, Guus; Gorter, Durk (2001). The Other Languages of Europe. Guus Extra & Durk Gorter. ISBN 9781853595097. Retrieved 26 May 2014. About 91,000 Muslim Georgians living in Turkey.

"Türkiye'deki Yaşayan Etnik Gruplar Araştırıldı". Milliyet (in Turkish). 6 June 2008. Retrieved 7 June 2008.

Ramet, Sabrina P. (1989). Religion and Nationalism in Soviet and East European Politics. Durham: Duke University Press. p. 187. ISBN 9780822308911.

69. Friedrich, Paul (1994). Encyclopedia of World Cultures: Russia and Eurasia, China (1. publ. ed.). Boston, Massachusetts: G.K. Hall. p. 150. ISBN 9780816118106. A part of the Ingilo population still retains the (Orthodox) Christian faith, but another, larger segment adheres to the Sunni sect of Islam.

Bibliography

• W.E.D. Allen (1970) Russian Embassies to the Georgian Kings, 1589–1605, Hakluyt Society, ISBN 978-1-4094-4599-9 (hbk)
• Eastmond, Anthony (2010), Royal Imagery in Medieval Georgia, Penn State Press
• Suny, R. G. (1994), The Making of the Georgian Nation, Indiana University Press, ISBN 978-0253209153
• Lang, D. M. (1966), The Georgians, Thames & Hudson
• Rayfield, D. (2013), Edge of Empires: A History of Georgia, Reaktion Books, ISBN 978-1789140590
• Rapp, S. H. Jr. (2016) The Sasanian World Through Georgian Eyes, Caucasia and the Iranian Commonwealth in Late Antique Georgian Literature, Sam Houston State University, USA, Routledge
• Toumanoff, C. (1963) Studies in Christian Caucasian History, Georgetown University Press

v t e Kartvelians

v t e Ethnic groups in Georgia

v t e Peoples of the Caucasus

v t e Georgia articles

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Georgian scripts

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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Georgian
damts'erloba "script" in Mkhedruli
Script type	Alphabet
Time period	AD 430[1] – present
Direction	left-to-right
Languages	Georgian other Kartvelian languages
Related scripts
Parent systems	Uncertain, alphabetical order modelled on Greek Georgian
ISO 15924
ISO 15924	Geor (240), ​Georgian (Mkhedruli and Mtavruli) – Georgian (Mkhedruli) Geok, 241 – Khutsuri (Asomtavruli and Nuskhuri)
Unicode
Unicode alias	Georgian
Unicode range	U+10A0–U+10FF Georgian U+2D00–U+2D2F Supplement U+1C90–U+1CBF Extended
This article contains phonetic transcriptions in the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, see Help:IPA. For the distinction between [ ], / / and ⟨ ⟩, see IPA § Brackets and transcription delimiters.

Living culture of three writing systems of the Georgian alphabet
UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage
Country	Georgia
Reference	01205
Region	Caucasus Eastern Europe
Inscription history
Inscription	2016 (11 session)

The Georgian scripts are the three writing systems used to write the Georgian language: Asomtavruli, Nuskhuri and Mkhedruli. Although the systems differ in appearance, their letters share the same names and alphabetical order and are written horizontally from left to right. Of the three scripts, Mkhedruli, once the civilian royal script of the Kingdom of Georgia and mostly used for the royal charters, is now the standard script for modern Georgian and its related Kartvelian languages, whereas Asomtavruli and Nuskhuri are used only by the Georgian Orthodox Church, in ceremonial religious texts and iconography.^[2]

Georgian scripts are unique in their appearance and their exact origin has never been established; however, in strictly structural terms, their alphabetical order largely corresponds to the Greek alphabet, with the exception of letters denoting uniquely Georgian sounds, which are grouped at the end.^[3][4] Originally consisting of 38 letters,^[5] Georgian is presently written in a 33-letter alphabet, as five letters are obsolete. The number of Georgian letters used in other Kartvelian languages varies. Mingrelian uses 36: thirty-three that are current Georgian letters, one obsolete Georgian letter, and two additional letters specific to Mingrelian and Svan. Laz uses the same 33 current Georgian letters as Mingrelian plus that same obsolete letter and a letter borrowed from Greek for a total of 35. The fourth Kartvelian language, Svan, is not commonly written, but when it is, it uses Georgian letters as utilized in Mingrelian, with an additional obsolete Georgian letter and sometimes supplemented by diacritics for its many vowels.^[2][6]

The "living culture of three writing systems of the Georgian alphabet" was granted the national status of intangible cultural heritage in Georgia in 2015^[7] and inscribed on the UNESCO Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity in 2016.^[8]

The three Georgian scripts: Asomtavruli, Nuskhuri, and Mkhedruli.

Origins

Bir el Qutt inscriptions, c. 430 AD, Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, Jerusalem

Bolnisi inscriptions, c. 494 AD, Simon Janashia Museum of Georgia, Tbilisi

The origin of the Georgian script is poorly known, and no full agreement exists among Georgian and foreign scholars as to its date of creation, who designed the script, and the main influences on that process.

The first attested version of the script is Asomtavruli, which dates back to the 5th century; the other scripts were formed in the following centuries. Most scholars link the creation of the Georgian script to the process of Christianization of Iberia (not to be confused with the Iberian Peninsula), a core Georgian kingdom of Kartli.^[9] The alphabet was therefore most probably created between the conversion of Iberia under King Mirian III (326 or 337) and the Bir el Qutt inscriptions of 430,.^[9][10] It was first used for translation of the Bible and other Christian literature into Georgian, by monks in Georgia and Palestine.^[4] Professor Levan Chilashvili's dating of fragmented Asomtavruli inscriptions, discovered by him at the ruined town of Nekresi, in Georgia's easternmost province of Kakheti, in the 1980s, to the 1st or 2nd century has not been accepted.^[11]

A Georgian tradition first attested in the medieval chronicle Lives of the Kings of Kartli (ca. 800),^[4] assigns a much earlier, pre-Christian origin to the Georgian alphabet, and names King Pharnavaz I (3rd century BC) as its inventor. This account is now considered legendary, and is rejected by scholarly consensus, as no archaeological confirmation has been found.^[4][12][13] Rapp considers the tradition to be an attempt by the Georgian Church to rebut the earlier tradition that the alphabet was invented by the Armenian scholar Mesrop Mashtots, and is a Georgian application of an Iranian model in which primordial kings are credited with the creation of basic social institutions.^[14] Georgian linguist Tamaz Gamkrelidze offers an alternative interpretation of the tradition, in the pre-Christian use of foreign scripts (alloglottography in the Aramaic alphabet) to write down Georgian texts.^[15]

Another point of contention among scholars is the role played by Armenian clerics in that process. According to medieval Armenian sources and a number of scholars, Mesrop Mashtots, generally acknowledged as the creator of the Armenian alphabet, also created the Georgian and Caucasian Albanian alphabets. This tradition originates in the works of Koryun, a fifth-century historian and biographer of Mashtots,^[16] and has been quoted by Donald Rayfield and James R. Russell,^[17][18] but has been rejected by Georgian scholarship and some Western scholars who judge the passage in Koryun unreliable or even a later interpolation.^[4] In his study on the history of the invention of the Armenian alphabet and the life of Mashtots, the Armenian linguist Hrachia Acharian strongly defended Koryun as a reliable source and rejected criticisms of his accounts on the invention of the Georgian script by Mashtots.^[19] Acharian dated the invention to 408, four years after Mashtots created the Armenian alphabet (he dated the latter event to 404).^[20] Some Western scholars quote Koryun's claims without taking a stance on its validity^[21][22] or concede that Armenian clerics, if not Mashtots himself, must have played a role in the creation of the Georgian script.^[4][13][23]

Another controversy regards the main influences at play in the Georgian alphabet, as scholars have debated whether it was inspired more by the Greek alphabet, or by Semitic alphabets such as Aramaic.^[15] Recent historiography focuses on greater similarities with the Greek alphabet than in the other Caucasian writing systems, most notably the order and numeric value of letters.^[3][4] Some scholars have also suggested certain pre-Christian Georgian cultural symbols or clan markers as a possible inspiration for particular letters.^[24]

Asomtavruli

Anbandidi Gospel in Asomtavruli, 9th century.

Asomtavruli (Georgian: ასომთავრული; Georgian pronunciation: [ɑsɔmtʰɑvɾuli]) is the oldest Georgian script. The name Asomtavruli means "capital letters", from aso (ასო) "letter" and mtavari (მთავარი) "principal/head". It is also known as Mrgvlovani (Georgian: მრგვლოვანი) "rounded", from mrgvali (მრგვალი) "round", so named because of its round letter shapes. Despite its name, this "capital" script is unicameral.^[25]

The oldest Asomtavruli inscriptions found so far date from the 5th century^[26] and are Bir el Qutt^[27] and the Bolnisi inscriptions.^[28]

From the 9th century, Nuskhuri script started becoming dominant, and the role of Asomtavruli was reduced. However, epigraphic monuments of the 10th to 18th centuries continued to be written in Asomtavruli script. Asomtavruli in this later period became more decorative. In the majority of 9th-century Georgian manuscripts which were written in Nuskhuri script, Asomtavruli was used for titles and the first letters of chapters.^[29] However, some manuscripts written completely in Asomtavruli can be found until the 11th century.^[30]

Form of Asomtavruli letters

In early Asomtavruli, the letters are of equal height. Georgian historian and philologist Pavle Ingorokva believes that the direction of Asomtavruli, like that of Greek, was initially boustrophedon, though the direction of the earliest surviving texts is from left to the right.^[31]

In most Asomtavruli letters, straight lines are horizontal or vertical and meet at right angles. The only letter with acute angles is Ⴟ (jani). There have been various attempts to explain this exception. Georgian linguist and art historian Helen Machavariani believes jani derives from a monogram of Christ, composed of Ⴈ (ini) and Ⴕ (kani).^[32] According to Georgian scholar Ramaz Pataridze, the cross-like shape of letter jani indicates the end of the alphabet, and has the same function as the similarly shaped Phoenician letter taw (), Greek chi (Χ), and Latin X,^[33] though these letters do not have that function in Phoenician, Greek, or Latin.

Coins of Queen Tamar of Georgia and King George IV of Georgia minted using Asomtavruli script, 1200–1210 AD.

From the 7th century, the forms of some letters began to change. The equal height of the letters was abandoned, with letters acquiring ascenders and descenders.^[34][35]

Asomtavruli letters

Ⴀ ani

Ⴁ bani

Ⴂ gani

Ⴃ doni

Ⴄ eni

Ⴅ vini

Ⴆ zeni

Ⴡ he

Ⴇ tani

Ⴈ ini

Ⴉ kʼani

Ⴊ lasi

Ⴋ mani

Ⴌ nari

Ⴢ hie

Ⴍ oni

Ⴎ pʼari

Ⴏ zhani

Ⴐ rae

Ⴑ sani

Ⴒ tʼari

Ⴣ vie

ႭჃ Ⴓ uni

Ⴔ pari

Ⴕ kani

Ⴖ ghani

Ⴗ qʼari

Ⴘ shini

Ⴙ chini

Ⴚ tsani

Ⴛ dzili

Ⴜ ts'ili

Ⴝ ch'ari

Ⴞ khani

Ⴤ qari

Ⴟ jani

Ⴠ hae

Ⴥ hoe

Asomtavruli illumination

In Nuskhuri manuscripts, Asomtavruli are used for titles and illuminated capitals. The latter were used at the beginnings of paragraphs which started new sections of text. In the early stages of the development of Nuskhuri texts, Asomtavruli letters were not elaborate and were distinguished principally by size and sometimes by being written in cinnabar ink. Later, from the 10th century, the letters were illuminated. The style of Asomtavruli capitals can be used to identify the era of a text. For example, in the Georgian manuscripts of the Byzantine era, when the styles of the Byzantine Empire influenced Kingdom of Georgia, capitals were illuminated with images of birds and other animals.^[36]

Decorative Asomtavruli capital letters, Ⴋ (m) and Ⴇ (t), 12–13th century.

From the 11th-century "limb-flowery", "limb-arrowy" and "limb-spotty" decorative forms of Asomtavruli are developed. The first two are found in 11th- and 12th-century monuments, whereas the third one is used until the 18th century.^[37][38]

Importance was attached also to the colour of the ink itself.^[39]

Asomtavruli letter Ⴃ (doni) is often written with decoration effects of fish and birds.^[40]

The "Curly" decorative form of Asomtavruli is also used where the letters are wattled or intermingled on each other, or the smaller letters are written inside other letters. It was mostly used for the headlines of the manuscripts or the books, although there are complete inscriptions which were written in the Asomtavruli "Curly" form only.^[41]

The title of Gospel of Matthew in Asomtavruli "Curly" decorative form.

Handwriting of Asomtavruli

The following table shows the stroke order and direction of each Asomtavruli letter:^[42]

Nuskhuri

Nuskhuri of John Tornike collection of the Monastery of Iviron, 10th century.

Nuskhuri (Georgian: ნუსხური; Georgian pronunciation: [nusχuɾi]) is the second Georgian script. The name nuskhuri comes from nuskha (ნუსხა), meaning "inventory" or "schedule". Nuskhuri was soon augmented with Asomtavruli illuminated capitals in religious manuscripts. The combination is called Khutsuri (Georgian: ხუცური, "clerical", from khutsesi (ხუცესი "cleric"), and it was principally used in hagiography.^[43]

Nuskhuri first appeared in the 9th century as a graphic variant of Asomtavruli.^[9] The oldest inscription is found in the Ateni Sioni Church and dates to 835 AD.^[44] The oldest surviving Nuskhuri manuscripts date to 864 AD.^[45] Nuskhuri becomes dominant over Asomtavruli from the 10th century.^[43]

Form of Nuskhuri letters

Nuskhuri letters vary in height, with ascenders and descenders, and are slanted to the right. Letters have an angular shape, with a noticeable tendency to simplify the shapes they had in Asomtavruli. This enabled faster writing of manuscripts.^[46]

→ →
Asomtavruli letters ⴍ (oni) and ⴣ (vie). A ligature of these letters produced a new letter in Nuskhuri, ⴓ uni.

Nuskhuri letters

ⴀ ani

ⴁ bani

ⴂ gani

ⴃ doni

ⴄ eni

ⴅ vini

ⴆ zeni

ⴡ he

ⴇ tani

ⴈ ini

ⴉ kʼani

ⴊ lasi

ⴋ mani

ⴌ nari

ⴢ hie

ⴍ oni

ⴎ pʼari

ⴏ zhani

ⴐ rae

ⴑ sani

ⴒ tʼari

ⴣ vie

ⴍⴣ ⴓ uni

ⴔ pari

ⴕ kani

ⴖ ghani

ⴗ qʼari

ⴘ shini

ⴙ chini

ⴚ tsani

ⴛ dzili

ⴜ tsʼili

ⴝ chʼari

ⴞ khani

ⴤ qari

ⴟ jani

ⴠ hae

ⴥ hoe

Note: Without proper font support, you may see question marks, boxes or other symbols instead of Nuskhuri letters.

Handwriting of Nuskhuri

The following table shows the stroke order and direction of each Nuskhuri letter:^[47]

Use of Asomtavruli and Nuskhuri today

Asomtavruli is used intensively in iconography, murals, and exterior design, especially in stone engravings.^[48] Georgian linguist Akaki Shanidze made an attempt in the 1950s to introduce Asomtavruli into the Mkhedruli script as capital letters to begin sentences, as in the Latin script, but it did not catch on.^[49] Asomtavruli and Nuskhuri are officially used by the Georgian Orthodox Church alongside Mkhedruli. Patriarch Ilia II of Georgia called on people to use all three Georgian scripts.^[50]

Mkhedruli

Royal charter of King Bagrat IV of Georgia in Mkhedruli, 11th century.

Royal charter of Queen Tamar of Georgia in Mkhedruli, 12th century.

Royal charter of King Vakhtang VI of Kartli in Mkhedruli, 1712 AD.

Mkhedruli (Georgian: მხედრული; Georgian pronunciation: [mχɛdɾuli]) is the third and current Georgian script. Mkhedruli, literally meaning "cavalry" or "military", derives from mkhedari (მხედარი) meaning "horseman", "knight", "warrior"^[51] and "cavalier".^[52]

Mkhedruli is bicameral, with capital letters that are called Mkhedruli Mtavruli (მხედრული მთავრული) or simply Mtavruli (მთავრული; Georgian pronunciation: [mtʰɑvɾuli]). Nowadays, Mkhedruli Mtavruli is only used in all-caps text in titles or to emphasize a word, though in the late 19th and early 20th centuries it was occasionally used, as in Latin and Cyrillic scripts, to capitalize proper nouns or the first word of a sentence. Contemporary Georgian script does not recognize capital letters and their usage has become decorative.^[53]

Mkhedruli first appears in the 10th century. The oldest Mkhedruli inscription is found in Ateni Sioni Church dating back to 982 AD. The second oldest Mkhedruli-written text is found in the 11th-century royal charters of King Bagrat IV of Georgia. Mkhedruli was mostly used then in the Kingdom of Georgia for the royal charters, historical documents, manuscripts and inscriptions.^[54] Mkhedruli was used for non-religious purposes only and represented the "civil", "royal" and "secular" script.^[55][56]

Mkhedruli became more and more dominant over the two other scripts, though Khutsuri (Nuskhuri with Asomtavruli) was used until the 19th century. Mkhedruli became the universal writing Georgian system outside of the Church in the 19th century with the establishment and development of printed Georgian fonts.^[57]

Form of Mkhedruli letters

Mkhedruli inscriptions of the 10th and 11th centuries are characterized in rounding of angular shapes of Nuskhuri letters and making the complete outlines in all of its letters. Mkhedruli letters are written in the four-linear system, similar to Nuskhuri. Mkhedruli becomes more round and free in writing. It breaks the strict frame of the previous two alphabets, Asomtavruli and Nuskhuri. Mkhedruli letters begin to get coupled and more free calligraphy develops.^[58]

Example of one of the oldest Mkhedruli-written texts found in the royal charter of King Bagrat IV of Georgia, 11th century.

"Gurgen : King : of Kings : great-grandfather : of mine : Bagrat Curopalates"

Coin of Queen Tamar of Georgia in Mkhedruli, 1187 AD.

Modern Georgian alphabet

The modern Georgian alphabet consists of 33 letters:

ა ani	ბ bani	გ gani	დ doni	ე eni	ვ vini	ზ zeni	თ tani	ი ini	კ k'ani	ლ lasi
მ mani	ნ nari	ო oni	პ p'ari	ჟ zhani	რ rae	ს sani	ტ t'ari	უ uni	ფ pari	ქ kani
ღ ghani	ყ q'ari	შ shini	ჩ chini	ც tsani	ძ dzili	წ ts'ili	ჭ ch'ari	ხ khani	ჯ jani	ჰ hae

Letters removed from the Georgian alphabet

The Society for the Spreading of Literacy among Georgians, founded by Prince Ilia Chavchavadze in 1879, discarded five letters from the Georgian alphabet that had become redundant:^[25]

ჱ he

ჲ hie

ჳ vie

ჴ qari

ჵ hoe

• ჱ (he) /eɪ/, Svan /eː/, sometimes called "ei"^[59] or "e-merve" ("eighth e"),^[60] was equivalent to ეჲ ey, as in ქრისტჱ ~ ქრისტეჲ kristʼey 'Christ'.
• ჲ (hie) /je/, also called yota,^[60] appeared instead of ი (ini) after a vowel, but came to have the same pronunciation as ი (ini) and was replaced by it. Thus, ქრისტჱ ~ ქრისტეჲ kristʼey "Christ" is now written ქრისტე kristʼe.
• ჳ (vie) /uɪ/, Svan /w/^[60] came to be pronounced the same as ვი vi and was replaced by that sequence, as in სხჳსი > სხვისი skhvisi "others'".
• ჴ (qari, hari) /q⁽ʰ⁾/^[60] came to be pronounced the same as ხ (khani), and was replaced by it. e.g. ჴელმწიფე qelmtsʼipe became ხელმწიფე khelmtsʼipe "sovereign".
• ჵ (hoe) /oː/^[60] was used for the interjection hoi! and is now spelled ჰოი. Also used in Bats for the /ʕ/ or /ɦ/ sound.

All but ჵ (hoe) continue to be used in the Svan alphabet; ჲ (hie) is used in the Mingrelian and Laz alphabets as well, for the y-sound /j/. Several others were used for Abkhaz and Ossetian in the short time they were written in Mkhedruli script.

Letters added to other alphabets

Mkhedruli has been adapted to languages besides Georgian. Some of these alphabets retained letters obsolete in Georgian, while others required additional letters:

ჶ fi

ჷ shva

ჸ elifi

ჹ turned gani

ჺ aini

ჼ modifier letter nar

ჽ aen

ჾ hard sign

ჿ labial sign

• ჶ (fi "phi") is used in Laz and Svan, and formerly in Ossetian and Abkhazian.^[2] It derives from the Greek letter Φ (phi).
• ჷ (shva "schwa"), also called yn, is used for the schwa sound in Svan and Mingrelian, and formerly in Ossetian and Abkhazian.^[2]
• ჸ (elifi "alif") is used in for the glottal stop in Svan and Mingrelian.^[2] It is a reversed ⟨ყ⟩ (q'ari).
• ჹ (turned gani) was once used for [ɢ] in evangelical literature in Dagestanian languages.^[2]
• ჼ (modifier nar) is used in Bats. It nasalizes the preceding vowel.^[61]
• ჺ (aini "ain") is occasionally used for [ʕ] in Bats.^[2] It derives from the Arabic letter ⟨ع⟩ (ʿayn)
• ჽ (aen) was used in the Ossetian language when it was written in the Georgian script. It was pronounced [ə].^[62]
• ჾ (hard sign) was used in Abkhaz for velarization of the preceding consonant.^[63]
• ჿ (labial sign) was used in Abkhaz for labialization of the preceding consonant.^[63]

Handwriting of Mkhedruli

The following table shows the stroke order and direction of each Mkhedruli letter:^[64][65][66]

ზ, ო, and ხ (zeni, oni, khani) are almost always written without the small tick at the end, while the handwritten form of ჯ (jani) often uses a vertical line, (sometimes with a taller ascender, or with a diagonal cross bar); even when it is written at a diagonal, the cross-bar is generally shorter than in print.

• Only four letters are x-height, with neither ascenders nor descenders: ა, თ, ი, ო.
• Thirteen have ascenders, like b or d in English: ბ, ზ, მ, ნ, პ, რ, ს, შ, ჩ, ძ, წ, ხ, ჰ
• An equal number have descenders, like p or q in English: გ, დ, ე, ვ, კ, ლ, ჟ, ტ, უ, ფ, ღ, ყ, ც
• Three letters have both ascenders and descenders, like þ in Old English: ქ, ჭ, and (in handwriting) ჯ. წ has both ascender and descender in print, and sometimes in handwriting.

Variation

Stylistic variation of letters რ and ლ on a street name sign for Rustaveli Avenue, showing variations in the name Rustaveli, with რუსთაველის resembling ɦუსთავეჺის.

Mtavruli, i.e. all-caps text, on a Georgian police car

There is individual and stylistic variation in many of the letters. For example, the top circle of ზ (zeni) and the top stroke of რ (rae) may go in the other direction than shown in the chart (that is, counter-clockwise starting at 3 o'clock, and upwards – see the external-link section for videos of people writing).

Other common variants:

• გ (gani) may be written like ვ (vini) with a closed loop at the bottom.
• დ (doni) is frequently written with a simple loop at top, .
• კ, ც, and ძ (k'ani, tsani, dzili) are generally written with straight, vertical lines at the top, so that for example ც (tsani) resembles a U with a dimple in the right side.
• ლ (lasi) is frequently written with a single arc, . Even when all three are written, they're generally not all the same size, as they are in print, but rather riding on one wide arc like two dimples in it.
• Rarely, ო (oni) is written as a right angle, .
• რ (rae) is frequently written with one arc, , like a Latin ⟨h⟩.
• ტ (t'ari) often has a small circle with a tail hanging into the bowl, rather than two small circles as in print, or as an O with a straight vertical line intersecting the top. It may also be rotated a bit clockwise, with the small circles further to the right and not as close to the top.
• წ (ts'ili) is generally written with a round bowl at the bottom, . Another variation features a triangular bowl.
• ჭ (ch'ari) may be written without the hook at the top, and often with a completely straight vertical line.
• ჱ (he) may be written without the loop, like a conflation of ს and ჰ.
• ჯ (jani) is sometimes written so that it looks like a hooked version of the Latin "X"

Similar letters

Several letters are similar and may be confused at first, especially in handwriting.

• For ვ (vini) and კ (k'ani), the critical difference is whether the top is a full arc or a (more-or-less) vertical line.
• For ვ (vini) and გ (gani), it is whether the bottom is an open curve or closed (a loop). The same is true of უ (uni) and შ (shini); in handwriting, the tops may look the same. Similarly ს (sani) and ხ (khani).
• For კ (k'ani) and პ (p'ari), the crucial difference is whether the letter is written below or above x-height, and whether it's written top-down or bottom-up.
• ძ (dzili) is written with a vertical top.

Ligatures, abbreviations and calligraphy

Calligraphy
Arabic Chinese Georgian Indian Islamic Japanese Korean Mongolian Persian Tibetan Vietnamese Western
v t e

Asomtavruli is often highly stylized and writers readily formed ligatures, intertwined letters, and placed letters within letters or other such monograms.^[67]

A ligature of the Asomtavruli initials of King Vakhtang I of Iberia, Ⴂ Ⴌ (გნ, GN)

A ligature of the Asomtavruli letters Ⴃ Ⴀ (და, da) "and"

Nuskhuri, like Asomtavruli, is also often highly stylized. Writers readily formed ligatures and abbreviations for nomina sacra, including diacritics called karagma, which resemble titla. Because writing materials such as vellum were scarce and therefore precious, abbreviating was a practical measure widespread in manuscripts and hagiography by the 11th century.^[68]

A Nuskhuri abbreviation of რომელი (romeli) "which"

A Nuskhuri abbreviation of იესუ ქრისტე (iesu kriste) "Jesus Christ"

Mkhedruli, in the 11th to 17th centuries also came to employ digraphs to the point that they were obligatory, requiring adherence to a complex system.^[69]

A Mkhedruli ligature of და (da) "and"

Mkhedruli calligraphy of Prince Garsevan Chavchavadze and King Archil of Imereti

Typefaces

Georgian scripts come in only a single typeface, though word processors can apply automatic ("fake")^[70] oblique and bold formatting to Georgian text. Traditionally, Asomtavruli was used for chapter or section titles, where Latin script might use bold or italic type.

Punctuation

In Asomtavruli and Nuskhuri punctuation, various combinations of dots were used as word dividers and to separate phrases, clauses, and paragraphs. In monumental inscriptions and manuscripts of 5th to 10th centuries, these were written as dashes, like −, = and =−. In the 10th century, clusters of one (·), two (:), three (჻) and six (჻჻) dots (later sometimes small circles) were introduced by Ephrem Mtsire to indicate increasing breaks in the text. One dot indicated a "minor stop" (presumably a simple word break), two dots marked or separated "special words", three dots for a "bigger stop" (such as the appositive name and title "the sovereign Alexander", below, or the title of the Gospel of Matthew, above), and six dots were to indicate the end of the sentence. Starting in the 11th century, marks resembling the apostrophe and comma came into use. An apostrophe was used to mark an interrogative word, and a comma appeared at the end of an interrogative sentence. From the 12th century on, these were replaced with the semicolon (the Greek question mark). In the 18th century, Patriarch Anton I of Georgia reformed the system again, with commas, single dots, and double dots used to mark "complete", "incomplete", and "final" sentences, respectively.^[71] For the most part, Georgian today uses the punctuation as in international usage of the Latin script.^[72]

Signature of King Alexander II of Kakheti, with the divider ⟨჻⟩
ჴლმწიფე ჻ ალექსანდრე
"The sovereign Alexander"

Summary

The Georgian letter ⟨ვ⟩ is on the Wikipedia logo (lower left).

The Alphabetic Tower seen on panorama of Georgia's port city of Batumi.

This table lists the three scripts in parallel columns, including the letters that are now obsolete in all alphabets (shown with a blue background), obsolete in Georgian but still used in other alphabets (green background), or additional letters in languages other than Georgian (pink background). The "national" transliteration is the system used by the Georgian government, whereas "Laz" is the Latin Laz alphabet used in Turkey. The table also shows the traditional numeric values of the letters.^[73]

Letters				Unicode (mkhedruli)	Name	IPA	Transcriptions				Numeric value
asomtavruli	nuskhuri	mkhedruli	mtavruli				National	ISO 9984	BGN	Laz
Ⴀ	ⴀ	ა	Ა	U+10D0	ani	/ɑ/, Svan /a, æ/	A a	A a	A a	A a	1
Ⴁ	ⴁ	ბ	Ბ	U+10D1	bani	/b/	B b	B b	B b	B b	2
Ⴂ	ⴂ	გ	Გ	U+10D2	gani	/ɡ/	G g	G g	G g	G g	3
Ⴃ	ⴃ	დ	Დ	U+10D3	doni	/d/	D d	D d	D d	D d	4
Ⴄ	ⴄ	ე	Ე	U+10D4	eni	/ɛ/	E e	E e	E e	E e	5
Ⴅ	ⴅ	ვ	Ვ	U+10D5	vini	/v/	V v	V v	V v	V v	6
Ⴆ	ⴆ	ზ	Ზ	U+10D6	zeni	/z/	Z z	Z z	Z z	Z z	7
Ⴡ	ⴡ	ჱ	Ჱ	U+10F1	he	/eɪ/, Svan /eː/	—	Ē ē	Ey ey	—	8
Ⴇ	ⴇ	თ	Თ	U+10D7	tani	/t⁽ʰ⁾/	T t	Tʼ tʼ	Tʼ tʼ	T t	9
Ⴈ	ⴈ	ი	Ი	U+10D8	ini	/i/	I i	I i	I i	I i	10
Ⴉ	ⴉ	კ	Კ	U+10D9	kʼani	/kʼ/	Kʼ kʼ	K k	K k	Ǩ ǩ	20
Ⴊ	ⴊ	ლ	Ლ	U+10DA	lasi	/l/	L l	L l	L l	L l	30
Ⴋ	ⴋ	მ	Მ	U+10DB	mani	/m/	M m	M m	M m	M m	40
Ⴌ	ⴌ	ნ	Ნ	U+10DC	nari	/n/	N n	N n	N n	N n	50
Ⴢ	ⴢ	ჲ	Ჲ	U+10F2	hie	/je/, Mingrelian, Laz, & Svan /j/	—	Y y	J j	Y y	60
Ⴍ	ⴍ	ო	Ო	U+10DD	oni	/ɔ/, Svan /ɔ, œ/	O o	O o	O o	O o	70
Ⴎ	ⴎ	პ	Პ	U+10DE	pʼari	/pʼ/	Pʼ pʼ	P p	P p	P̌ p̌	80
Ⴏ	ⴏ	ჟ	Ჟ	U+10DF	zhani	/ʒ/	Zh zh	Ž ž	Zh zh	J j	90
Ⴐ	ⴐ	რ	Რ	U+10E0	rae	/r/	R r	R r	R r	R r	100
Ⴑ	ⴑ	ს	Ს	U+10E1	sani	/s/	S s	S s	S s	S s	200
Ⴒ	ⴒ	ტ	Ტ	U+10E2	tʼari	/tʼ/	Tʼ tʼ	T t	T t	Ť t̆	300
Ⴣ	ⴣ	ჳ	Ჳ	U+10F3	vie	/uɪ/, Svan /w/	—	W w	—	—	400[74]
Ⴓ	ⴓ	უ	Უ	U+10E3	uni	/u/, Svan /u, y/	U u	U u	U u	U u	400[74]
Ⴧ	ⴧ	ჷ	Ჷ	U+10F7	yn, schva	Mingrelian, Laz & Svan /ə/	—	—	—	—	—
Ⴔ	ⴔ	ფ	Ფ	U+10E4	pari	/p⁽ʰ⁾/	P p	Pʼ pʼ	Pʼ pʼ	P p	500
Ⴕ	ⴕ	ქ	Ქ	U+10E5	kani	/k⁽ʰ⁾/	K k	Kʼ kʼ	Kʼ kʼ	K k	600
Ⴖ	ⴖ	ღ	Ღ	U+10E6	ghani	/ɣ/	Gh gh	Ḡ ḡ	Gh gh	Ğ ğ	700
Ⴗ	ⴗ	ყ	Ყ	U+10E7	qʼari	/qʼ/	Qʼ qʼ	Q q	Q q	Q q	800
—	—	ჸ	Ჸ	U+10F8	elif	Mingrelian & Svan /ʔ/	—	—	—	—	—
Ⴘ	ⴘ	შ	Შ	U+10E8	shini	/ʃ/	Sh sh	Š š	Sh sh	Ş ş	900
Ⴙ	ⴙ	ჩ	Ჩ	U+10E9	chini	/tʃ⁽ʰ⁾/	Ch ch	Čʼ čʼ	Chʼ chʼ	Ç ç	1000
Ⴚ	ⴚ	ც	Ც	U+10EA	tsani	/ts⁽ʰ⁾/	Ts ts	Cʼ cʼ	Tsʼ tsʼ	Ʒ ʒ	2000
Ⴛ	ⴛ	ძ	Ძ	U+10EB	dzili	/dz/	Dz dz	J j	Dz dz	Ž ž	3000
Ⴜ	ⴜ	წ	Წ	U+10EC	tsʼili	/tsʼ/	Tsʼ tsʼ	C c	Ts ts	Ǯ ǯ	4000
Ⴝ	ⴝ	ჭ	Ჭ	U+10ED	chʼari	/tʃʼ/	Chʼ chʼ	Č č	Ch ch	Ç̌ ç̌	5000
Ⴞ	ⴞ	ხ	Ხ	U+10EE	khani	/χ/	Kh kh	X x	Kh kh	X x	6000
Ⴤ	ⴤ	ჴ	Ჴ	U+10F4	qari, hari	/q⁽ʰ⁾/	—	H̱ ẖ	qʼ	—	7000
Ⴟ	ⴟ	ჯ	Ჯ	U+10EF	jani	/dʒ/	J j	J̌ ǰ	J j	C c	8000
Ⴠ	ⴠ	ჰ	Ჰ	U+10F0	hae	/h/	H h	H h	H h	H h	9000
Ⴥ	ⴥ	ჵ	Ჵ	U+10F5	hoe	/oː/, Bats /ʕ, ɦ/	—	Ō ō	—	—	10000
—	—	ჶ	Ჶ	U+10F6	fi	Laz & Ossetian /f/	—	F f	—	F f	—
—	—	ჹ	Ჹ	U+10F9	turned gani	Dagestanian languages /ɢ/ in evangelical literature[2]	—	—	—	—	—
—	—	ჺ	Ჺ	U+10FA	aini	Bats /ʕ/[2]	—	—	—	—	—
—	—	ჼ	—	U+10FC	modifier nar	Bats /◌̃/ nasalization of preceding vowel[61]	—	—	—	—	—
Ⴭ	ⴭ	ჽ	Ჽ	U+10FD	aen[63]	Ossetian /ə/[62]	—	—	—	—	—
—	—	ჾ	Ჾ	U+10FE	hard sign[63]	Abkhaz velarization of preceding consonant[63]	—	—	—	—	—
—	—	ჿ	Ჿ	U+10FF	labial sign[63]	Abkhaz labialization of preceding consonant[63]	—	—	—	—	—

Use for other non-Kartvelian languages

Ossetian text written in Mtavruli script, from a book on Ossetian folklore published in South Ossetia in 1940. The non-Georgian letters ჶ [f] and ჷ [ə] can be seen.

Old Avar crosses with Avar inscriptions in Asomtavruli script.

• Ossetian language until the 1940s.^[75]
• Abkhaz language until the 1940s.^[76]
• Ingush language (historically), later replaced in the 17th century by Arabic and by the Cyrillic script in modern times.^[77]
• Chechen language (historically), later replaced in the 17th century by Arabic and by the Cyrillic script in modern times.^[78]
• Avar language (historically), later replaced in the 17th century by Arabic and by the Cyrillic script in modern times.^[79][80]
• Turkish language and Azerbaijani language. A Turkish Gospel, dictionary, poems, medical book dating from the 18th century.^[81]
• Persian language. The 18th-century Persian translation of the Arabic Gospel is kept at the National Center of Manuscripts in Tbilisi.
• Armenian language. In the Armenian community in Tbilisi, the Georgian script was occasionally used for writing Armenian in the 18th and 19th centuries, and some samples of this kind of texts are kept at the Georgian National Center of Manuscripts in Tbilisi.^[82]
• Russian language. In the collections of the National Center of Manuscripts in Tbilisi there are also a few short poems in the Russian language written in Georgian script dating from the late 18th and early 19th centuries.
• Azerbaijani language. Used by Azeris in Georgia.^[83]
• Other Northeast Caucasian languages. The Georgian script was used for writing North Caucasian and Dagestani languages in connection with Georgian missionary activities in the areas starting in the 18th century.^[84]

Computing

The Georgian letter ⟨ღ⟩ (ghani) is often used as a love or heart symbol online.

The Georgian letter ⟨ლ⟩ (lasi) is sometimes used as a hand or fist in emoticons ( ex: ლ(╹◡╹ლ) ).

Unicode

The first Georgian script was included in Unicode Standard in October 1991 with the release of version 1.0. In creating the Georgian Unicode block, important roles were played by German Jost Gippert, a linguist of Kartvelian studies, and American-Irish linguist and script-encoder Michael Everson, who created the Georgian Unicode for the Macintosh systems.^[85] Significant contributions were also made by Anton Dumbadze and Irakli Garibashvili^[86] (not to be mistaken with the Prime Minister of Georgia Irakli Garibashvili).

Georgian Mkhedruli script received an official status for being Georgia's internationalized domain name script for (.გე).^[87]

Mtavruli letters were added in Unicode version 11.0 in June 2018.^[88] They are capital letters with similar letterforms to Mkhedruli, but with descenders shifted above the baseline, with a wider central oval, and with the top slightly higher than the ascender height.^[89][90][91] Before this addition, font creators included Mtavruli in various ways. Some fonts came in pairs, of which one had lowercase letters and the other uppercase; some Unicode fonts placed Mtavruli letterforms in the Asomtavruli range (U+10A0-U+10CF) or in the Private Use Area, and some ASCII-based ones mapped them to the ASCII capital letters.^[53]

Blocks

Main articles: Georgian (Unicode block), Georgian Supplement (Unicode block), and Georgian Extended (Unicode block)

Georgian characters are found in three Unicode blocks. The first block (U+10A0–U+10FF) is simply called Georgian. Mkhedruli (modern Georgian) occupies the U+10D0–U+10FF range (shown in the bottom half of the first table below) and Asomtavruli occupies the U+10A0–U+10CF range (shown in the top half of the same table). The second block is the Georgian Supplement (U+2D00–U+2D2F), and it contains Nuskhuri.^[2] Mtavruli capitals are included in the Georgian Extended block (U+1C90–U+1CBF).

Mtavruli is defined as the upper case, but not title case, of Mkhedruli, and Asomtavruli as the upper case and title case of Nuskhuri.^[92]

Georgian[1][2] Official Unicode Consortium code chart (PDF)

0

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

A

B

C

D

E

F

U+10Ax

Ⴀ

Ⴁ

Ⴂ

Ⴃ

Ⴄ

Ⴅ

Ⴆ

Ⴇ

Ⴈ

Ⴉ

Ⴊ

Ⴋ

Ⴌ

Ⴍ

Ⴎ

Ⴏ

U+10Bx

Ⴐ

Ⴑ

Ⴒ

Ⴓ

Ⴔ

Ⴕ

Ⴖ

Ⴗ

Ⴘ

Ⴙ

Ⴚ

Ⴛ

Ⴜ

Ⴝ

Ⴞ

Ⴟ

U+10Cx

Ⴠ

Ⴡ

Ⴢ

Ⴣ

Ⴤ

Ⴥ

Ⴧ

Ⴭ

U+10Dx

ა

ბ

გ

დ

ე

ვ

ზ

თ

ი

კ

ლ

მ

ნ

ო

პ

ჟ

U+10Ex

რ

ს

ტ

უ

ფ

ქ

ღ

ყ

შ

ჩ

ც

ძ

წ

ჭ

ხ

ჯ

U+10Fx

ჰ

ჱ

ჲ

ჳ

ჴ

ჵ

ჶ

ჷ

ჸ

ჹ

ჺ

჻

ჼ

ჽ

ჾ

ჿ

Notes 1.^ As of Unicode version 15.0 2.^ Grey areas indicate non-assigned code points

Georgian Supplement[1][2] Official Unicode Consortium code chart (PDF)

0

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

A

B

C

D

E

F

U+2D0x

ⴀ

ⴁ

ⴂ

ⴃ

ⴄ

ⴅ

ⴆ

ⴇ

ⴈ

ⴉ

ⴊ

ⴋ

ⴌ

ⴍ

ⴎ

ⴏ

U+2D1x

ⴐ

ⴑ

ⴒ

ⴓ

ⴔ

ⴕ

ⴖ

ⴗ

ⴘ

ⴙ

ⴚ

ⴛ

ⴜ

ⴝ

ⴞ

ⴟ

U+2D2x

ⴠ

ⴡ

ⴢ

ⴣ

ⴤ

ⴥ

ⴧ

ⴭ

Notes 1.^ As of Unicode version 15.0 2.^ Grey areas indicate non-assigned code points

Georgian Extended[1][2] Official Unicode Consortium code chart (PDF)

0

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

A

B

C

D

E

F

U+1C9x

Ა

Ბ

Გ

Დ

Ე

Ვ

Ზ

Თ

Ი

Კ

Ლ

Მ

Ნ

Ო

Პ

Ჟ

U+1CAx

Რ

Ს

Ტ

Უ

Ფ

Ქ

Ღ

Ყ

Შ

Ჩ

Ც

Ძ

Წ

Ჭ

Ხ

Ჯ

U+1CBx

Ჰ

Ჱ

Ჲ

Ჳ

Ჴ

Ჵ

Ჶ

Ჷ

Ჸ

Ჹ

Ჺ

Ჽ

Ჾ

Ჿ

Notes 1.^ As of Unicode version 15.0 2.^ Grey areas indicate non-assigned code points

Non-Unicode encodings

Mac OS Georgian is an unofficial^{[clarification needed]} character encoding created by Michael Everson for Georgian on classic Mac OS. It is an extended ASCII encoding, using the 128 code points from 0x80 through 0xFF to represent the characters of the Asomtavruli and Mkhedruli scripts plus a number of widely-used symbols not included in 7-bit ASCII.^[93]

Keyboard layouts

Main article: Georgian keyboard layout

Below is the standard Georgian-language keyboard layout, the traditional layout of manual typewriters.

“ „

1 !

2 ?

3 №

4 §

5 %

6 :

7 .

8 ;

9 ,

0 /

- _

+ =

←  Backspace

Tab key

ღ

ჯ

უ

კ

ე ჱ

ნ

გ

შ

წ

ზ

ხ ჴ

ც

) (

Caps lock

ფ ჶ

ძ

ვ ჳ

თ

ა

პ

რ

ო

ლ

დ

ჟ

Enter key  ↵

Shift key  ↑

ჭ

ჩ

ყ

ს

მ

ი ჲ

ტ

ქ

ბ

ჰ ჵ

Shift key  ↑

Control key

Win key

Alt key

Space bar

AltGr key

Win key

Menu key

Control key

Gallery

Gallery of Asomtavruli, Nuskhuri, Mkhedruli and Mtavruli scripts.

Gallery of Asomtavruli

• 

  Asomtavruli of the 6th and 7th centuries

• 

  Asomtavruli at Barakoni

• 

  Doliskana inscriptions in Asomtavruli

• 

  Asomtavruli inscription at Ishkhani

• 

  Asomtavruli inscription at Nikortsminda Cathedral

Gallery of Nuskhuri

• 

  Nuskhuri of 8th to 10th centuries

• 

  Nuskhuri of Jruchi Gospels, 13th century

• 

  Nuskhuri of the 11th century

• 

  Nuskhuri of Mokvi

• 

  Nuskhuri Iadgari of Mikael Modrekili, 10th century

• 

  Nuskhuri by Nikrai, 12th century

Gallery of Mkhedruli

• 

  Handwriten Mkhedruli royal charter of King Bagrat IV of Georgia

• 

  Mkhedruli royal charter of King George II of Georgia

• 

  Handwriten Mkhedruli royal charter of King David IV of Georgia. The small text at top is written with Nuskhuri.

• 

  Mkhedruli royal charter of King George III of Georgia

• 

  Mkhedruli royal charter of Queen Tamar of Georgia

• 

  Mkhedruli royal charter of King George IV of Georgia

• 

  Mkhedruli royal charter of King George V of Georgia

Gallery of Mtavruli

• 

  Mtavruli letters cast on a large-cone string casting machine, designed by Anton Dumbadze.

• 

  "Beautiful Georgian Letters" on a modern monumental inscription with Mtavruli type.

• 

  Abkhaz Mtavruli alphabet (1938-1953).

• 

  "Upper Abkhazia" Georgian road sign in Azhara, using Mtavruli letters.

• 

  Trilingual sign of the Abkhazian State University, using Mtavruli letters for the Georgian name.

References

1. 
   

Oldest found Georgian inscription so far. Exact date of introduction is unclear.

Unicode Standard, V. 6.3. U10A0, p. 3

Shanidze 2000, p. 444.

Seibt, Werner. "The Creation of the Caucasian Alphabets as Phenomenon of Cultural History".

Machavariani 2011, p. 329.

Hüning, Vogl & Moliner 2012, p. 299.

"Georgian alphabet granted cultural heritage status". Agenda.ge. 10 March 2015. Archived from the original on 1 December 2016. Retrieved 30 November 2016.

"Living culture of three writing systems of the Georgian alphabet". Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. UNESCO. Archived from the original on 3 December 2016. Retrieved 30 November 2016.

Hewitt 1995, p. 4.

West 2010, p. 230: Archaeological work in the last decade has confirmed that a Georgian alphabet did exist very early in Georgia's history, with the first examples being dated from the fifth century C.E.

Rapp 2003, p. 19: footnote 43: "The date of the supposed grave marker is hopelessly circumstantial ... I cannot support Chilashvili's dubious hypothesis."

Rayfield 2013.

Rapp 2010, p. 139.

Rapp 2006, p. 38.

Kemertelidze 1999, pp. 228-.

Koryun (1981). "The life of Mashtots". armenianhouse.org. Translated by Bedros Norehad. Archived from the original on 2011-09-27. Retrieved 2018-04-24.

Rayfield 2013, p. 19: "The Georgian alphabet seems unlikely to have a pre-Christian origin, for the major archaeological monument of the 1st century 4IX the bilingual Armazi gravestone commemorating Serafua, daughter of the Georgian viceroy of Mtskheta, is inscribed in Greek and Aramaic only. It has been believed, and not only in Armenia, that all the Caucasian alphabets — Armenian, Georgian and Caucaso-Albanian — were invented in the 4th century by the Armenian scholar Mesrop Mashtots.<...> The Georgian chronicles The Life of Kartli – assert that a Georgian script was invented two centuries before Christ, an assertion unsupported by archaeology. There is a possibility that the Georgians, like many minor nations of the area, wrote in a foreign language — Persian, Aramaic, or Greek — and translated back as they read."

Bowersock, Brown & Grabar 1999, p. 289: Alphabets. "Mastoc' was a charismatic visionary who accomplished his task at a time when Armenia stood in danger of losing both its national identity, through partition, and its newly acquired Christian faith, through Sassanian pressure and reversion to paganism. By preaching in Armenian, he was able to undermine and co-opt the discourse founded in native tradition, and to create a counterweight against both Byzantine and Syriac cultural hegemony in the church. Mastoc' also created the Georgian and Caucasian-Albanian alphabets, based on the Armenian model."

Acharian, Hrachia (1984). Հայոց գրերը [The Armenian Script] (in Armenian). Yerevan: Hayastan Publishing. p. 181. «Կասկածել Կորյունի վրա՝ նշանակում է առհասարակ ուրանալ պատմությունը։» translation: "To doubt Koryun['s account] means to deny history itself.

Acharian, Hrachia (1984). Հայոց գրերը [The Armenian Script] (in Armenian). Yerevan: Hayastan Publishing. p. 391. «408 ... հնարում է վրաց գրերը»

Thomson 1996, pp. xxii–xxiii.

Rapp 2003, p. 450: "There is also the claim advanced by Koriwn in his saintly biography of Mashtoc' (Mesrop) that the Georgian script had been invented at the direction of Mashtoc'. Yet it is within the realm of possibility that this tradition, repeated by many later Armenian historians, may not have been part of the original fifth-century text at all but added after 607. Significantly, all of the extant MSS containing The Life of Mashtoc* were copied centuries after the split. Consequently, scribal manipulation reflecting post-schism (especially anti-Georgian) attitudes potentially contaminates all MSS copied after that time. It is therefore conceivable, though not yet proven, that valuable information about Georgia transmitted by pre-schism Armenian texts was excised by later, post-schism individuals."

Greppin 1981, pp. 449–456.

Haarmann 2012, p. 299.

Daniels 1996, p. 367.

Machavariani 2011, p. 177.

ქსე, ტ. 7, თბ., 1984, გვ. 651–652

შანიძე ა., ქართული საბჭოთა ენციკლოპედია, ტ. 2, გვ. 454–455, თბ., 1977 წელი

კ. დანელია, ზ. სარჯველაძე, ქართული პალეოგრაფია, თბილისი, 1997, გვ. 218–219

ე. მაჭავარიანი, მწიგნობრობაჲ ქართული, თბილისი, 1989

პ. ინგოროყვა, „შოთა რუსთაველი“, „მნათობი“, 1966, No. 3, გვ. 116

Machavariani 2011, pp. 121–122.

რ. პატარიძე, ქართული ასომთავრული, თბილისი, 1980, გვ. 151, 260–261

ივ. ჯავახიშვილი, ქართული დამწერლობათა-მცოდნეობა ანუ პალეოგრაფია, თბილისი, 1949, 185–187

ე. მაჭავარიანი, ქართული ანბანი, თბილისი, 1977, გვ. 5–6

ელენე მაჭავარიანი, ენციკლოპედია „ქართული ენა“, თბილისი, 2008, გვ. 403–404

ვ. სილოგავა, ენციკლოპედია „ქართული ენა“, თბილისი, 2008, გვ. 269–271

ივ. ჯავახიშვილი, ქართული დამწერლობათა-მცოდნეობა ანუ პალეოგრაფია, თბილისი, 1949, 124–126

Machavariani 2011, p. 120.

Machavariani 2011, p. 129.

ივ. ჯავახიშვილი, ქართული დამწერლობათა-მცოდნეობა ანუ პალეოგრაფია, თბილისი, 1949, 127–128

Mchedlidze 2013, p. 105.

კ. დანელია, ზ. სარჯველაძე, ქართული პალეოგრაფია, თბილისი, 1997, გვ. 219

გ. აბრამიშვილი, ატენის სიონის უცნობი წარწერები, "მაცნე" (ისტ. და არქეოლოგ. სერია), 1976, No. c2, გვ. 170

კ. დანელია, ზ. სარჯველაძე, ქართული პალეოგრაფია, თბილისი, 1997, გვ. 218

ე. მაჭავარიანი, ქართული ანბანი, თბილისი, 1977

Mchedlidze 2013, p. 107.

"Lasha Kintsurashvili: About Georgian calligraphy". Archived from the original on 2012-05-14. Retrieved 2012-01-03.

Gillam 2003, p. 249.

(in Georgian) ილია მეორე ერს ქართული ენის დაცვისკენ კიდევ ერთხელ მოუწოდებს Archived 2016-03-04 at the Wayback Machine საქინფორმ.გე

Nakanishi 1990, p. 22.

Allen & Gugushvili 1937, p. 324.

Everson, Michael; Gujejiani, Nika; Razmadze, Akaki (January 24, 2016). "Proposal for the addition of Georgian characters to the UCS" (PDF). Unicode Technical Committee Document Registry. Archived (PDF) from the original on September 11, 2017. Retrieved June 14, 2018.

ატენის სიონის უცნობი წარწერები, აბრამიშვილი, გვ. 170-1

Katzner & Miller 2002, p. 118.

Chambers Encyclopedia 1901, p. 165.

Putkaradze, T. (2006), "Development of the Georgian writing system", History of Georgian language, p. paragraph II, 2.1.5

მაჭავარიანი, თბილისი, 1977

Shanidze 1973, p. 18.

Otar Jishkariani, Praise of the Alphabet, 1986, Tbilisi, p. 1

Ager, Simon (n.d.). "Bats alphabet, pronunciation and language". Omniglot. Archived from the original on 2018-08-03. Retrieved 2018-04-24.

Ager, Simon (n.d.). "Ossetian language, alphabet and pronunciation". omniglot.com. Archived from the original on 2018-04-24. Retrieved 2018-04-24.

Everson, Michael; Melkadze, Ninell; Pentzlin, Karl; Yevlampiev, Ilya (17 February 2010). "Proposal for encoding Georgian and Nuskhuri letters for Ossetian and Abkhaz" (PDF). unicode.org. Archived (PDF) from the original on 6 July 2017. Retrieved 2018-04-24.

Aronson 1990, pp. 21–25.

Paolini & Cholokashvili 1629.

Mchedlidze 2013, p. 110.

Ingorokva, Pavle ქართული დამწერლობის ძეგლები ანტიკური ხანისა (The monuments of ancient Georgian script) Archived 2012-03-09 at the Wayback Machine

Shanidze 2003.

შანიძე, 2003

Simonson, Mark (20 June 2005). "Fake vs. True Italics". Mark Simonson Studio. Archived from the original on 14 May 2018. Retrieved 2018-04-24.

Georgian Soviet Encyclopedia, V. 8, p. 231, Tbilisi, 1984

Gillam 2003, p. 252.

Aronson 1990, pp. 30–31.

ჳ and უ have the same numeric value (400)

George 2009, p. 104.

The Abkhazians: A Handbook, George Hewitt, p. 171

Язык, история и культура вайнахов, И. Ю Алироев p.85, Чех-Инг. изд.-полигр. об-ние "Книга", 1990

Чеченский язык, И. Ю. Алироев, p.24, Академия, 1999

Грузинско-дагестанские языковые контакты, Маджид Шарипович Халилов p.29, Наука, 2004

История аварцев, М. Г Магомедов p.150, Дагестанский гос. университет, 2005

Enwall 2010, pp. 144–145.

Enwall 2010, p. 137.

Steffen, James (2013-10-31). The Cinema of Sergei Parajanov. University of Wisconsin Pres. ISBN 978-0-299-29653-7.

Enwall 2010, pp. 137–138.

უნიკოდში ქართულის ასახვის ისტორია (History of the Georgian Unicode) Archived 2014-03-09 at the Wayback Machine Georgian Unicode fonts by BPG-InfoTech

Font Contributors Acknowledgements Archived 2018-03-22 at the Wayback Machine Unicode

(in Georgian) საქართველოში საინტერნეტო მისამართები მხედრული ანბანით დაიწერება Archived 2016-01-22 at the Wayback Machine Rustavi 2

"Unicode 11.0.0". Unicode Consortium. June 5, 2018. Archived from the original on June 6, 2018. Retrieved June 5, 2018.

"Mtavruli for Perfect Bicameral Fonts". BPG Georgian Fonts. February 24, 2016. Archived from the original on January 26, 2018. Retrieved August 15, 2017.

"The Unicode Standard, Version 11.0 - U110-1C90.pdf" (PDF). Unicode.org. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2018-05-08. Retrieved 2018-03-25.

Everson, Michael; Gujejiani, Nika; Vakhtangishvili, Giorgi; Razmadze, Akaki (2017-06-24). "Action plan for the complete representation of Mtavruli characters" (PDF). Unicode Technical Committee Document Registry. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2019-06-15. Retrieved 2018-01-26.

"7: Europe-I: Modern and Liturgical Scripts" (PDF). The Unicode Standard Version 11.0 – Core Specification. Unicode Consortium. June 5, 2018. Retrieved 8 June 2018.

93. Everson, Michael (2002-02-20). "Mac OS Georgian to Unicode table". Evertype. Retrieved 2020-12-07.

Sources

• Allen, William Edward David; Gugushvili, A., eds. (1937). Georgica: A Journal of Georgian and Caucasian Studies (4–5): 324. {{cite journal}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
• Aronson, Howard Isaac (1990). Georgian: A Reading Grammar. Columbus, OH: Slavica Publishers. ISBN 978-0-89357-207-5.
• Bowersock, Glen Warren; Brown, Peter; Grabar, Oleg (1999). Late Antiquity: A Guide to the Postclassical World. Harvard University Press. ISBN 978-0-674-51173-6.
• "Georgia". Chambers's encyclopaedia; a dictionary of universal knowledge. Vol. 5. London: W. & R. Chambers. 1901.
• Daniels, Peter T. (1996). The World's Writing Systems. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-507993-7.
• Enwall, Joakim (2010). "Turkish texts in Georgian script: Sociolinguistic and ethno-linguistic aspects". In Boeschoten, Hendrik; Rentzsch, Julian (eds.). Turcology in Mainz. Otto Harrassowitz Verlag. ISBN 978-3-447-06113-1.
• George, Julie A. (2009). The Politics of Ethnic Separatism in Russia and Georgia. Palgrave Macmillan US. ISBN 978-0-230-10232-3.
• Gillam, Richard (2003). Unicode Demystified: A Practical Programmer's Guide to the Encoding Standard. Addison-Wesley Professional. ISBN 978-0-201-70052-7.
• Greppin, John A.C. (1981). "Some comments on the origin of the Georgian alphabet". Bazmavēp (139): 449–456.*Haarmann, Harald (2012). "Ethnic Conflict and standardisation in the Caucasus". In Matthias Hüning; Ulrike Vogl; Olivier Moliner (eds.). Standard Languages and Multilingualism in European History. John Benjamins Publishing. p. 299. ISBN 978-90-272-0055-6.
• Hewitt, B. G. (1995). Georgian: A Structural Reference Grammar. John Benjamins Publishing. ISBN 978-90-272-3802-3.
• Hüning, Matthias; Vogl, Ulrike; Moliner, Olivier (2012). Standard Languages and Multilingualism in European History. John Benjamins Publishing. ISBN 978-90-272-0055-6.
• Katzner, Kenneth; Miller, Kirk (2002). The Languages of the World. Routledge. ISBN 978-1-134-53288-9.
• Kemertelidze, Nino (1999). "The Origin of Kartuli (Georgian) Writing (Alphabet)". In David Cram; Andrew R. Linn; Elke Nowak (eds.). History of Linguistics 1996. Vol. 1: Traditions in Linguistics Worldwide. John Benjamins Publishing Company. ISBN 978-90-272-8382-5.
• Machavariani, E. (2011). Georgian manuscripts. Tbilisi.
• Mchedlidze, T. (2013). The restored Georgian alphabet. Fulda, Germany.
• Nakanishi, Akira (1990). Writing Systems of the World. Tuttle Publishing. ISBN 978-0-8048-1654-0.
• Paolini, Stefano; Cholokashvili, Nikoloz (1629), Dittionario giorgiano e italiano, Rome: Palazzo di Propaganda Fide
• Rapp, Stephen H. (2003). Studies in medieval Georgian historiography: early texts and Eurasian contexts. Peeters Publishers. ISBN 978-90-429-1318-9.
• Rapp, Stephen H. (2006). "Recovering the Pre-National Caucasian Landscape". Mythical Landscapes then and Now: The Mystification: 13–52.
• Rapp, Stephen H. (2010). "Georgian Christianity". In Ken Parry (ed.). The Blackwell Companion to Eastern Christianity. John Wiley & Sons. ISBN 978-1-4443-3361-9.
• Rayfield, Donald (2013). The Literature of Georgia: A History. RoutledgeCurzon. ISBN 978-0-7007-1163-5.
• Shanidze, Mzekala (2000). "Greek influence in Georgian linguistics". In Sylvain Auroux (ed.). History of the Language Sciences / Geschichte der Sprachwissenschaften / Histoire des sciences du language. Walter de Gruyter. ISBN 978-3-11-019400-5.
• Shanidze, Akaki (2003), ქართული ენა [The Georgian Language] (in Georgian), Tbilisi, ISBN 978-1-4020-1440-6
• Shanidze, Akaki (1973). The Basics of the Georgian language grammar. Tbilisi.
• Thomson, Robert W. (1996). Rewriting Caucasian History: The Medieval Armenian Adaptation of the Georgian Chronicles : the Original Georgian Texts and the Armenian Adaptation. Clarendon Press. ISBN 978-0-19-826373-9.
• West, Barbara A. (2010). Encyclopedia of the Peoples of Asia and Oceania. Infobase Publishing. ISBN 978-1-4381-1913-7.

Further reading

1. Barnaveli, T. Inscriptions of Ateni Sioni Tbilisi, 1977
2. Gamkrelidze, T. Writing system and the old Georgian script Tbilisi, 1989
3. Javakhishvili, I. Georgian palaeography Tbilisi, 1949
4. Kilanawa, B. Georgian script in the writing systems Tbilisi, 1990
5. Khurtsilava, B. The Georgian asomtavruli alphabet and its authors: Bakur and Gri Ormizd, Tbilisi, 2009
6. Pataridze, R. Georgian Asomtavruli Tbilisi, 1980
7. Shosted, Ryan K.; Chikovani, Vakhtang (2006), "Standard Georgian", Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 36 (2): 255–264, doi:10.1017/S0025100306002659

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Georgian scripts.

• Gallery of Mkhedruli, Omniglot page on Mkhedruli which shows some stylistic variations mentioned above
• Georgian alphabet animation on YouTube, produced by the Ministry of Education and Science of Georgia. Gives the sound of each letter, illustrates several fonts, and shows the stroke order of each letter.
• Lasha Kintsurashvili and Levan Chaganava, submissions to the 2014 International Exhibition of Calligraphy
• Reference grammar of Georgian by Howard Aronson (SEELRC, Duke University)
• "Unicode Code Chart (10A0–10FF) for Georgian scripts" (PDF). (105 KB)
• "Transliteration of Georgian" (PDF). (105 KB)

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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

For other uses of "Georgian", see Georgian (disambiguation).

Georgian era
1714 – 1830 (1837)
The Georgian architecture of the Royal Crescent in the city of Bath
Including	Regency era
Monarch(s)	George I George II George III George IV William IV
Leader(s)	George, Prince of Wales[1] Caroline, Queen Consort[1] George, Prince Regent[1]

Prime ministers

← Preceded by Stuart period Followed by → Victorian era

Periods in English history

Prehistoric Britain until c. 43 AD British Iron Age c. 800 BC Roman Britain c. 43–410 Sub-Roman Britain c. 400s – late 500s Anglo-Saxon c. 500–1066 Norman 1066–1154 Plantagenet 1154–1485 Tudor 1485–1603 Elizabethan 1558–1603 Stuart 1603–1714 Jacobean 1603–1625 Caroline 1625–1649 (Interregnum) 1649–1660 Restoration 1660–1714 Georgian era 1714–1837 Regency era 1811–1820 Victorian era 1837–1901 Edwardian era 1901–1914 First World War 1914–1918 Interwar Britain 1919–1939 Second World War 1939–1945 Postwar Britain (political) 1945–1979 Postwar Britain (social) 1945–1979 See also Political history (1979–present) Social history (1979–present)

Timeline

v t e

The Georgian era was a period in British history from 1714 to c. 1830–1837, named after the Hanoverian kings George I, George II, George III and George IV. The definition of the Georgian era is often extended to include the relatively short reign of William IV, which ended with his death in 1837. The subperiod that is the Regency era is defined by the regency of George IV as Prince of Wales during the illness of his father George III.^[2] The transition to the Victorian era was characterized in religion, social values, and the arts by a shift in tone away from rationalism and toward romanticism and mysticism.

The term Georgian is typically used in the contexts of social and political history and architecture. The term Augustan literature is often used for Augustan drama, Augustan poetry and Augustan prose in the period 1700–1740s. The term Augustan refers to the acknowledgement of the influence of Latin literature from the ancient Roman Republic.^[3]

The term Georgian era is not applied to the time of the two 20th-century British kings of this name, George V and George VI. Those periods are simply referred to as Georgian.^[4]

Arts and culture

Georgian society and its preoccupations were well portrayed in the novels of writers such as Daniel Defoe, Jonathan Swift, Samuel Richardson, Henry Fielding, Laurence Sterne, Mary Shelley and Jane Austen, characterised by the architecture of Robert Adam, John Nash and James Wyatt and the emergence of the Gothic Revival style, which hearkened back to a supposed golden age of building design.

The flowering of the arts was most vividly shown in the emergence of the Romantic poets, principally through Samuel Taylor Coleridge, William Wordsworth, Percy Bysshe Shelley, William Blake, John Keats, Lord Byron and Robert Burns. Their work ushered in a new era of poetry, characterised by vivid and colourful language, evocative of elevating ideas and themes.^[5]

The paintings of Thomas Gainsborough, Sir Joshua Reynolds and the young J. M. W. Turner and John Constable illustrated the changing world of the Georgian period – as did the work of designers like Capability Brown, the landscape designer.

Fine examples of distinctive Georgian architecture are Edinburgh's New Town, Georgian Dublin, Grainger Town in Newcastle upon Tyne, the Georgian Quarter of Liverpool and much of Bristol and Bath.

The music of John Field, Handel, Haydn, Clementi, Johann Christian Bach, William Boyce, Mozart, Beethoven and Mendelssohn was some of the most popular in England at that time.

Grand Tour

The height of the Grand Tour coincided with the 18th century and is associated with Georgian high society. This custom saw young upper-class Englishmen travelling to Italy by way of France and the Netherlands for intellectual and cultural purposes.^[6] Notable historian Edward Gibbon remarked of the Grand Tour as useful for intellectual self-improvement.^[7] The journey and stay abroad would usually take a year or more. This would eventually lead to the basis for the acquisition and spread of art collections back to England as well as fashions and paintings from Italy.^[6] The custom also helped popularise the macaroni style that was soon to become fashionable at the time.^[8]

Social change

18th-century London

It was a time of immense social change in Britain, with the beginnings of the Industrial Revolution which began the process of intensifying class divisions, and the emergence of rival political parties like the Whigs and Tories.

In rural areas the Agricultural Revolution saw huge changes to the movement of people and the decline of small communities, the growth of the cities and the beginnings of an integrated transportation system but, nevertheless, as rural towns and villages declined and work became scarce there was a huge increase in emigration to Canada, the North American colonies (which became the United States during the period) and other parts of the British Empire.

Evangelical religion and social reform

In England, the evangelical movement inside and outside the Church of England gained strength in the late 18th and early 19th century. The movement challenged the traditional religious sensibility that emphasised a code of honour for the upper class, and suitable behaviour for everyone else, together with faithful observances of rituals. John Wesley (1703–1791) and his followers preached revivalist religion, trying to convert individuals to a personal relationship with Christ through Bible reading, regular prayer, and especially the revival experience. Wesley himself preached 52,000 times, calling on men and women to "redeem the time" and save their souls. Wesley always operated inside the Church of England, but at his death, his followers set up outside institutions that became the Methodist Church.^[9] It stood alongside the traditional nonconformist churches, Presbyterians, Congregationalist, Baptists, Unitarians, and Quakers. The nonconformist churches, however, were less influenced by revivalism.^[10]

The Church of England remained dominant in England but it had a growing evangelical, revivalist faction, the "Low Church". Its leaders included William Wilberforce and Hannah More. It reached the upper class through the Clapham Sect. It did not seek political reform, but rather the opportunity to save souls through political action by freeing slaves, abolishing the duel, prohibiting cruelty to children and animals, stopping gambling, and avoiding frivolity on the Sabbath; they read the Bible every day. All souls were equal in God's view, but not all bodies, so evangelicals did not challenge the hierarchical structure of English society.^[11] As R. J. Morris noted in his 1983 article "Voluntary Societies and British Urban Elites, 1780-1850," "[m]id-eighteenth-century Britain was a stable society in the sense that those with material and ideological power were able to defend this power in an effective and dynamic manner," but "in the twenty years after 1780, this consensus structure was broken."^[12] Anglican Evangelicalism thus, as historian Lisa Wood has argued in her book Modes of Discipline: Women, Conservatism, and the Novel After the French Revolution, functioned as a tool of ruling-class social control, buffering the discontent that in France had inaugurated a revolution; yet it contained within itself the seeds for challenge to gender and class hierarchies.^[13]

Empire

The Georgian period saw continual warfare, with France the primary enemy. Major episodes included the Seven Years' War, known in America as the French and Indian War (1754–1763), the American Revolutionary War (1775–1783), the French Revolutionary Wars (1792–1802), the Irish Rebellion of 1798, and the Napoleonic Wars (1803–1815). The British won most of the wars except for the American Revolution, where the combined weight of the United States, France, Spain and the Netherlands overwhelmed Britain, which stood alone without allies.^[14]

The British Empire at the end of the Napoleonic Wars in 1815

The loss of the 13 American Colonies was a national disaster. Commentators at home and abroad speculated on the end of Britain as a great power. In Europe, the wars with France dragged on for nearly a quarter of a century, 1793–1815. Britain organised coalition after coalition, using its superb financial system to subsidise infantry forces, and built up its Navy to maintain control of the seas. Victory over Napoleon at the Battle of Trafalgar (1805) and the Battle of Waterloo (1815) under Admiral Lord Nelson and the Duke of Wellington brought a sense of triumphalism and political reaction.^[15]

The expansion of empire in Asia was primarily the work of the British East India Company, especially under the leadership of Robert Clive.^[16] Captain James Cook was perhaps the most prominent of the many explorers and geographers using the resources of the Royal Navy to develop the Empire and make many scientific discoveries, especially in Australia and the Pacific.^[17] Instead of trying to recover the lost colonies in North America, the British built up in Asia a largely new Second British Empire. That new empire flourished during the Victorian and Edwardian eras which were to follow.^[18]

The trading nation

East Indiaman in the China Seas

The era was prosperous as entrepreneurs extended the range of their business around the globe. By the 1720s Britain was one of the most prosperous countries in the world, and Daniel Defoe boasted:

we are the most "diligent nation in the world. Vast trade, rich manufactures, mighty wealth, universal correspondence, and happy success have been constant companions of England, and given us the title of an industrious people."^[19]

While the other major powers were primarily motivated towards territorial gains, and protection of their dynasties (such as the Habsburg and Bourbon dynasties, and the House of Hohenzollern), Britain had a different set of primary interests. Its main diplomatic goal (besides protecting the homeland from invasion) was building a worldwide trading network for its merchants, manufacturers, shippers and financiers. This required a hegemonic Royal Navy so powerful that no rival could sweep its ships from the world's trading routes, or invade the British Isles. The London government enhanced the private sector by incorporating numerous privately financed London-based companies for establishing trading posts and opening import-export businesses across the world. Each was given a monopoly of trade to the specified geographical region. The first enterprise was the Muscovy Company set up in 1555 to trade with Russia. Other prominent enterprises included the East India Company, and the Hudson's Bay Company in Canada. The Company of Royal Adventurers Trading to Africa had been set up in 1662 to trade in gold, ivory and slaves in Africa; it was re-established as the Royal African Company in 1672 and focused on the slave trade. British involvement in the each of the four major wars, 1740 to 1783, paid off handsomely in terms of trade. Even the loss of the 13 colonies was made up by a very favourable trading relationship with the new United States of America. British gained dominance in the trade with India, and largely dominated the highly lucrative slave, sugar, and commercial trades originating in West Africa and the West Indies. China would be next on the agenda. Other powers set up similar monopolies on a much smaller scale; only the Netherlands emphasized trade as much as England.^[20][21]

The subscription room at Lloyd's of London in the early 19th century

Mercantilism was the basic policy imposed by Britain on its colonies.^[22] Mercantilism meant that the government and the merchants became partners with the goal of increasing political power and private wealth, to the exclusion of other empires. The government protected its merchants—and kept others out—by trade barriers, regulations, and subsidies to domestic industries in order to maximise exports from and minimise imports to the realm. The government had to fight smuggling, which became a favourite American technique in the 18th century to circumvent the restrictions on trading with the French, Spanish or Dutch. The goal of mercantilism was to run trade surpluses, so that gold and silver would pour into London. The government took its share through duties and taxes, with the remainder going to merchants in Britain. The government spent much of its revenue on a large and powerful Royal Navy, which not only protected the British colonies but threatened the colonies of the other empires, and sometimes seized them. The colonies were captive markets for British industry, and the goal was to enrich the mother country.^[23]

Most of the companies earned good profits, and enormous personal fortunes were created in India, but there was one major fiasco that caused heavy losses. The South Sea Bubble was a business enterprise that exploded in scandal. The South Sea Company was a private business corporation supposedly set up much like the other trading companies, with a focus on South America. Its actual purpose was to renegotiate previous high-interest government loans amounting to £31 million through market manipulation and speculation. It issued stock four times in 1720 that reached about 8,000 investors. Prices kept soaring every day, from £130 a share to £1,000, with insiders making huge paper profits. The Bubble collapsed overnight, ruining many speculators. Investigations showed bribes had reached into high places—even to the king. The future prime minister Robert Walpole managed to wind it down with minimal political and economic damage, although some suffering extreme loss fled to exile or committed suicide.^[24][25]

Political and social revolt

An Old Bailey trial, c. 1808

The beginning of the Georgian era witnessed rioting by Jacobite and High Church mobs in protest against the Hanoverian succession and which included attacks on the Dissenters' places of worship. These included the 1714 coronation riots, which occurred on the day of George I's coronation, and the riots of 1715. In response, Parliament passed the Riot Act, which granted the authorities greater powers to put down rioting.^[26][27]

Although religious toleration was extensive by the standards of continental Europe, hostility to religious minorities was widespread in Britain during the eighteenth century and sometimes expressed itself in rioting.^[28] The Jewish Naturalisation Act 1753 was repealed a year after it had been passed because of widespread opposition and the 1780 Gordon Riots in London were directed against Catholics after the Papists Act 1778 removed some of their legal disabilities. During the 1791 Priestley Riots in Birmingham, the mob targeted Dissenters, including the prominent Radical Joseph Priestley.^[29]

The Black Act of 1723, sponsored by Robert Walpole, strengthened the criminal code for the benefit of the upper class.^[30] It specified over 200 capital crimes, many with intensified punishment. The crime of arson, for example, was expanded to include of burning or the threat of burning haystacks. The legal rights of defendants were something different from today. For example, suspects who refused to surrender within 40 days could be summarily judged guilty and sentenced to execution if apprehended. Local villages were punished if they failed to find, prosecute and convict alleged criminals, due to the increase in crime at the time.^[31]

With the ending of the War with France in 1815, Great Britain entered a period of greater economic depression and political uncertainty, characterised by social discontent and unrest. The Radical political party published a leaflet called The Political Register, also known as "The Two Penny Trash" to its rivals. The so-called March of the Blanketeers saw 400 spinners and weavers march from Manchester to London in March 1817 to hand the Government a petition. The Luddites destroyed and damaged machinery in the industrial north-west of England. The Peterloo Massacre in 1819 began as a protest rally which saw 60,000 people gathering to protest about their living standards, but was quelled by military action and saw eleven people killed and 400 wounded. The Cato Street Conspiracy of 1820 sought to blow up the Cabinet and then move on to storm the Tower of London and overthrow the government. This too was thwarted, with the conspirators executed or transported to Australia.

Enlightenment

Further information: Age of Enlightenment

Distinguished Men of Science.^[32] Use your cursor to see who is who.^[33]

Historians have long explored the importance of the Scottish Enlightenment, as well as the American Enlightenment,^[34] while debating the very existence of the English Enlightenment.

Scottish Enlightenment

Main article: Scottish Enlightenment

English historian Peter Gay argues that the Scottish Enlightenment "was a small and cohesive group of friends – David Hume, Adam Smith, Adam Ferguson, and others – who knew one another intimately and talked to one another incessantly".^[35] Education was a priority in Scotland, both at the local level and especially in four universities that had stronger reputations than any in England. The Enlightenment culture was based on close readings of new books, and intense discussions that took place daily at such intellectual gathering places in Edinburgh as The Select Society and, later, The Poker Club as well as within Scotland's ancient universities (St Andrews, Glasgow, Edinburgh and Aberdeen).^[36] Sharing the humanist and rationalist outlook of the European Enlightenment of the same time period, the thinkers of the Scottish Enlightenment asserted the importance of human reason combined with a rejection of any authority that could not be justified by reason. In Scotland, the Enlightenment was characterised by a thoroughgoing empiricism and practicality where the chief values were improvement, virtue, and practical benefit for the individual and society as a whole. Among the fields that rapidly advanced were philosophy, economics, history, architecture, and medicine. Leaders included Francis Hutcheson, David Hume, Adam Smith, Dugald Stewart, Thomas Reid, William Robertson, Henry Home, Lord Kames, Adam Ferguson, John Playfair, Joseph Black and James Hutton. The Scottish Enlightenment influenced England and the American colonies, and to a lesser extent continental Europe.^[37]

English Enlightenment

Edward Jenner performing his first vaccination in 1796

The very existence of an English Enlightenment has been debated by scholars. The majority of textbooks and standard surveys make no room for an English Enlightenment. Some European surveys include England, others ignore it but do include coverage of such major intellectuals as Joseph Addison, Edward Gibbon, John Locke, Isaac Newton, Alexander Pope and Joshua Reynolds.^[38] Roy Porter argues that the reason for the neglect was the assumption that the movement was primarily French-inspired, that it was largely a-religious or anti-clerical, and it stood in outspoken defiance to the established order.^[39] Porter admits that after the 1720s, England could claim thinkers to equal Diderot, Voltaire or Rousseau. Indeed, its leading intellectuals, such as Edward Gibbon,^[40] Edmund Burke and Samuel Johnson were all quite conservative and supported the standing order. Porter says the reason was that Enlightenment had come early to England, and had succeeded so that the culture had accepted political liberalism, philosophical empiricism and religious toleration of the sort that intellectuals on the continent had to fight for against powerful odds. The coffee-house culture provided an ideal venue for enlightened conversation. Furthermore, England rejected the collectivism of the continent, and emphasized the improvement of individuals as the main goal of enlightenment.^[41]

Science and medicine

The British sponsored numerous scientists who made major discoveries in the small laboratories. Joseph Priestley investigated electricity. Chemist Henry Cavendish identified hydrogen in 1772. Daniel Rutherford isolated nitrogen in 1774, while Priestley discovered oxygen and ammonia. Antiquarians and archaeologists mapped the past.^[42] In medicine, in 1717 Lady Mary Wortley Montagu introduced inoculation against smallpox and Britain, and by 1740 it was in wide usage. Guy's Hospital was founded in 1721; the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh in 1729; Queen Charlotte's maternity hospital in 1739 and the Middlesex Hospital in 1745. Asylums for the mentally ill were established, notably Bethel Hospital in Norwich (1713); a ward for incurable lunatics at Guy's Hospital (1728); and lunatic hospitals in Manchester (1766) and York in (1777)—York was the first to be called an asylum.^[43]

Ending

Historians debate the exact ending, with the deaths of George IV in 1830 or William IV in 1837 as the usual marker. In most social and cultural trends, the timing varied. The emergence of Romanticism and literature began as early as the 1780s, but religious changes took much longer and were incomplete until around a century later. The 1830s saw important developments such as the emergence of the Oxford Movement in religion and the demise of classical architecture. Victorians typically were disapproving of the times of the previous era. By the late 19th century, the "Georgian era" was a byword for a degenerate culture.^[44] Charles Abbey in 1878 argued that the Church of England:

partook of the general sordidness of the age; it was an age of great material prosperity, but of moral and spiritual poverty, such as hardly finds a parallel in our history. Mercenary motives were to predominate everywhere, in the Church as well as in the state.^[45]

Timeline

1714

Upon the death of his second cousin Queen Anne, George Louis, Elector of Hanover, succeeds as the new King, George I, of Great Britain and Ireland, the former of which had itself been established in 1707. This is the beginning of the House of Hanover's reign over the British Crown.

1715

The Whig Party wins the British parliamentary election for the House of Commons. This party is dominant until 1760.

1727

George I dies on 11 June. His son George, Prince of Wales, ascends to the throne as George II

An Incident in the Rebellion of 1745, depicting the Battle of Culloden of 1746, where British troops defeated the Jacobite Army

1745

The final Jacobite rising is crushed at the Battle of Culloden in April 1746.

1760

George II dies on 25 October, and his grandson George, Prince of Wales, ascends to the throne as George III.

1763

Britain is victorious in the Seven Years' War. The Treaty of Paris of 1763 grants Britain domain over vast new territories around the world.

1765

The Stamp Act is passed by the Parliament of Great Britain, causing much unrest in the Thirteen Colonies in North America.

1769–1770

Australia and New Zealand are claimed as British colonies.

1773

The Inclosure Act 1773 is put into place by the British Parliament. This act brought about the enclosure of land and removing the right of common land access. This began an internal mass movement of rural poor from the countryside into the cities.

1775

The American Revolutionary War begins in the Thirteen Colonies, specifically in Massachusetts; all royal officials are expelled.

1776

The Thirteen Colonies in North America declare their independence. King George III is determined to recover them.

British general John Burgoyne shown surrendering at Saratoga in 1777

1777

The main British invasion army under Gen. Burgoyne surrenders at Saratoga; the French increase their aid to the Americans.

1778

France forms in a military alliance with the United States and declares war on Britain. The Netherlands and Spain support France; Britain has no major allies.

1781

The British Army in America under Lord Cornwallis surrenders to George Washington after its defeat in Yorktown, Virginia, in October 1781. The French Navy controls the seas.

1782

Battle of the Saintes: Admiral Sir George Rodney defeated a French fleet under the Comte de Grasse, enabling the Royal Navy to control the West Indies.

1783

Great Britain formally recognises the independence of the original 13 American States in the Treaty of Paris of 1783. The geographical terms are very generous to the Americans, and the expectation that Anglo-American trade will become of major importance.

1788

Australia is settled through penal transportation to the colony of New South Wales from 26 January.

1789

Thomas Robert Malthus, an Anglican cleric, authors An Essay on the Principle of Population. This work, the origin of Malthusianism, posited a need for population control to avoid poverty and famine or conflict over scare resources.

1801

The Act of Union 1800 comes into effect on 1 January, uniting the Kingdoms of Great Britain and of Ireland into the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland

1807

The Abolition of the Slave Trade Act became law, making it illegal to engage in the slave trade throughout the British Empire, partly as a result of a twenty-year parliamentary campaign by William Wilberforce.

1811

George, Prince of Wales, begins his nine-year period as the regent (he became known as George, Prince Regent) for George III, who had become delusional. This sub-period of the Georgian era is known as the Regency era.

1815

Napoleon I of France is defeated by the Seventh Coalition under The Duke of Wellington at the Battle of Waterloo.

1819

The Peterloo Massacre occurs.

1820

George III dies on 29 January, and his son George, Prince Regent, ascends to the throne of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland as George IV. He had been the effective ruler since 1811 as regent for his seriously ill father.

1830

George IV dies on 26 June. Some historians date this as the end of the Georgian era of the House of Hanover. However, many other authorities continue this era during the relatively short reign of his younger brother, who became King William IV.

1833

Slavery Abolition Act passed by Parliament through the influence of William Wilberforce and the Evangelical movement. The slaveowners are generously paid off.

1837

Transition to the Victorian era. King William IV dies on 20 June, ending the Georgian era. He was succeeded by his niece, Queen Victoria.

Monarchs

George I

George II

George III

George IV

William IV

See also

• Bloody Code
• Early modern Britain
• Historiography of the British Empire
• Historiography of the United Kingdom
• International relations 1648–1814
• The Georgian Group

Further reading

• Andress, David. The savage storm: Britain on the brink in the age of Napoleon (2012).
• Armstrong, Anthony. The Church of England: the Methodists and society, 1700–1850 (1973).
• Bannister, Jerry, and Liam Riordan, eds. The Loyal Atlantic: Remaking the British Atlantic in the Revolutionary Era (U of Toronto Press, 2012).
• Bates, Stephen. Year of Waterloo: Britain in 1815 (2015).
• Begiato, Joanne. "Between poise and power: embodied manliness in eighteenth-and nineteenth-century British culture." Transactions of the Royal Historical Society 26 (2016): 125–147. Online
• Black, Jeremy. "Georges I & II: Limited monarchs." History Today 53.2 (2003): 11+
• Black, Jeremy. The Hanoverians: The History of a Dynasty (2004), 288 pp.
• Briggs, Asa. The making of modern England, 1783–1867: The age of improvement (1959) online.
• Chandler, Timothy. "The development of a sporting tradition at Oxbridge, 1800-1860" Canadian Journal of History of Sport (1988) vol 19 pp:1-29. Emergence of cricket and rowing at Cambridge and Oxford.
• Curl, James Stevens. Georgian Architecture (English Heritage, 2011).
• Ellis, Joyce. The Georgian Town, 1680–1840 (2001).
• Evans, E. J. Britain before the Reform Act: politics and society 1815–1832 (1989).
• Gould, Eliga H. "American independence and Britain's counter-revolution", Past & Present (1997) #154 pp. 107–41.
• Gregg, Pauline. A Social and Economic History of Britain: 1760–1950 (1950) online
• Hochschild, Adam. Bury the Chains, The British Struggle to Abolish Slavery (Basingstoke: Pan Macmillan, 2005).
• Holmes, Richard. The Age of Wonder: How the Romantic Generation Discovered the Beauty and Terror of Science (2009).
• Hunt, Tamara L. Defining John Bull: political caricature and national identity in late Georgian England (Taylor & Francis, 2017).
• Hunt, William. The History of England from the Accession of George III to the close of Pitt's first Administration (1905), highly detailed on politics and diplomacy, 1760–1801. online
• Leadam, I. S. The History of England From The Accession of Anne To The Death of George II (1912) online, highly detailed on politics and diplomacy 1702–1760.
• Mokyr, Joel. The Enlightened Economy: An Economic History of Britain 1700–1850 (2010).
• Mori, Jennifer. Britain in the Age of the French Revolution: 1785–1820 (Routledge, 2014).
• Newman, Gerald, ed. (1997). Britain in the Hanoverian Age, 1714–1837: An Encyclopedia. Taylor & Francis. ISBN 978-0-8153-0396-1. online review; 904pp; short articles by experts
• O'Brien, Patrick K. "The political economy of British taxation, 1660‐1815", in Economic History Review (1988) 41#1 pp: 1–32. in JSTOR

• Parsons, Timothy H. The British imperial century, 1815–1914: A world history perspective (Rowman & Littlefield, 2019).
• Plumb, J. H. The First Four Georges. Revised ed. Hamlyn, 1974.
• Porter, Roy. English Society in the Eighteenth Century (1991) excerpt
• Rendell, Mike. Trailblazing Women of the Georgian Era: The Eighteenth-Century Struggle for Female Success in a Man's World (Pen and Sword, 2018).
• Robertson, Charles. England under the Hanoverians (1911) online
• Robson, Eric. "The American Revolution Reconsidered." History Today (Feb 1952) 3#3 pp 126–132.
• Royle, Edward, and James Walvin. English radicals and reformers, 1760–1848 (UP of Kentucky, 1982).
• Rule. John. Albion's People: English Society 1714–1815 (1992)
• Schweizer, Karl W., and Jeremy Black, eds. Politics and the Press in Hanoverian Britain (E. Mellon Press, 1989).
• Thomas, Peter D. G. (1985). "George III and the American Revolution". History. 70 (228): 16–31. doi:10.1111/j.1468-229X.1985.tb02477.x.
• Trevelyan, G. M. British History in the Nineteenth Century (1782–1901) (1901) online
• Turner, M. J. The Age of Unease: government and reform in Britain, 1782–1832 (2000)
• Watson J. Steven. The Reign of George III: 1760–1815 (1960), scholarly survey; online
• Webb, R. K. Modern England: from the 18th century to the present (1968) online university textbook
• Williams, Basil. The Whig Supremacy 1714–1760 (1939) online edition, wide-ranging survey
• Wilson, Charles. England's apprenticeship, 1603–1763 (1967), comprehensive economic and business history.
• Woodward; E. L. The Age of Reform, 1815–1870, (1938), wide-ranging survey online

Historiography and memory

• Boyd, Hilton. A Mad, Bad, and Dangerous People?: England 1783–1846 (2008) 783pp; wide-ranging survey with emphasis on historiography
• Bultmann, William A. "Early Hanoverian England (1714–60): Some Recent Writings." Journal of Modern History 35.1 (1963): 46-61 online in JSTOR; also reprinted in Elizabeth Chapin Furber, ed. Changing views on British history: essays on historical writing since 1939 (Harvard UP, 1966), pp. 181–205.
• Dixon, Nicholas, "From Georgian to Victorian," History Review, (Dec 2010), Issue 68
• O'Gorman, Frank. "The Recent Historiography of the Hanoverian Regime." Historical Journal 29#4 (1986): 1005–1020. online
• Reitan, E. A. (editor) (1964). George III, Tyrant Or Constitutional Monarch?. scholarly essays
• Simms, Brendan and Torsten Riotte, eds. The Hanoverian Dimension in British History, 1714–1837 (2009) online, focus on Hanover
• Snyder, Henry L. "Early Georgian England", in Richard Schlatter, ed., Recent Views on British History: Essays on Historical Writing since 1966 (Rutgers UP, 1984), pp. 167–196, historiography

Note: In the twentieth century, the period 1910–1936 was informally called the Georgian Era during the reign of George V (following the Edwardian Era), and is sometimes still referred to as such;^[46] see Georgian Poetry.

References

1. 
   

Pryde, E. B., ed. (1996). Handbook of British Chronology. Cambridge University Press. pp. 46–47. ISBN 978-0-521-56350-5.

John Steven Watson. "George III King of Great Britain". Britannica.

Roger D. Lund, Ridicule, Religion and the Politics of Wit in Augustan England (Ashgate, 2013), ch. 1.

"Georgian Definition & Meaning". Dictionary.com. Retrieved 13 May 2022.

Aleksandr Georgievich, and David Minaevich Gamezardashvili Baramidze, Georgian literature (The Minerva Group, 2001).

"Grand Tour". Oxford Reference. Retrieved 20 May 2022.

E. Chaney, "Gibbon, Beckford and the Interpretation of Dreams, Waking Thoughts and Incidents", The Beckford Society Annual Lectures (London, 2004), pp. 25–50.

Amelia Rauser, Hair, Authenticity, The Self Made Macaroni (Johns Hopkins University Press, Fall 2004) p. 101.

Anthony Armstrong, The Church of England: the Methodists and society, 1700–1850 (1973).

Asa Briggs, The age of improvement, 1783–1867 (1959), pp. 66–73.

John Rule, Albion's People: English Society 1714–1815 (1992), ch. 2–6.

Morris, R. J. (March 1983). "Voluntary Societies and British Urban Elites, 1780–1850: An Analysis". The Historical Journal. 26 (1): 99. doi:10.1017/S0018246X00019610. S2CID 162351383.

Wood, Lisa (2003). Modes of Discipline: Women, Conservatism, and the Novel after the French Revolution. Lewisburg, PA: Bucknell University Press. pp. 42–44.

Jeremy Black, Crisis of Empire: Britain and America in the Eighteenth Century (2010).

Eliga H. Gould, "American independence and Britain's counter-revolution", Past & Present (1997) #154 pp. 107–41.

P. Bruce Buchan, "The East India Company 1749–1800: The evolution of a territorial strategy and the changing role of the directors." Business and Economic History (1994): 52–61.

John McAleer, and Nigel Rigby, Captain Cook and the Pacific: art, exploration and empire (Yale UP, 2017).

G. C. Bolton, "The Founding of the Second British Empire." Economic History Review 19.1 (1966): 195–200.

Julian Hoppit, A Land of Liberty?: England 1689–1727 (2000), p. 344.

Eric J. Evans, The forging of the modern state: early industrial Britain, 1783–1872 (1996), p. 31.

Ann M. Carlos and Stephen Nicholas. "'Giants of an Earlier Capitalism': The Chartered Trading Companies as Modern Multinationals." Business history review 62#3 (1988): 398-419. in JSTOR

Max Savelle, Seeds of Liberty: The Genesis of the American Mind (2005), pp. 204–211

William R. Nester, The Great Frontier War: Britain, France, and the Imperial Struggle for North America, 1607–1755 (Praeger, 2000), p. 54.

Hoppit, A Land of Liberty?: England 1689–1727 (2000), pp. 334–38.

Julian Hoppit, "The Myths of the South Sea Bubble", Transactions of the Royal Historical Society (1962), 12#1 pp. 141–165.

Nicholas Rogers, 'Riot and Popular Jacobitism in Early Hanoverian England', in Eveline Cruickshanks (ed.), Ideology and Conspiracy: Aspects of Jacobitism, 1689–1759 (Edinburgh: John Donald, 1982), pp. 70–88.

Paul Kleber Monod, Jacobitism and the English People, 1688–1788 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), pp. 173-194.

Paul Langford, A Polite and Commercial People: England, 1727–1783 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998), p. 291.

Langford, pp. 291-292.

A. J. Graham Cummings and Jack Fruchtman, ed. (1997). Britain in the Hanoverian Age, 1714–1837: An Encyclopedia. p. 58. ISBN 978-0-8153-0396-1.

Leon Radzinowicz, "The Waltham Black Act: A study of the legislative attitude towards crime in the eighteenth century". Cambridge Law Journal (1945). 9#1 pp. 56–81.

Engraving after 'Men of Science Living in 1807-8', John Gilbert engraved by George Zobel and William Walker, ref. NPG 1075a, National Portrait Gallery, London, accessed February 2010

Smith, HM (May 1941). "Eminent men of science living in 1807-8". J. Chem. Educ. 18 (5): 203. doi:10.1021/ed018p203.

Adrienne Koch, ed., The American enlightenment: The shaping of the American experiment and a free society (1965).

Peter Gay, ed. The Enlightenment: A comprehensive anthology (1973), p. 15.

Matthew Daniel Eddy, "Natural History, Natural Philosophy and Readership", in Stephen Brown and Warren McDougall, eds., The Edinburgh History of the Book in Scotland, Vol. II: Enlightenment and Expansion, 1707–1800 (2012), pp. 297–309 online

David Daiches, Peter Jones, Jean Jones, eds., A Hotbed of Genius: The Scottish Enlightenment 1731–1790 (Edinburgh UP, 1986).

Peter Gay, ed. The Enlightenment: A comprehensive anthology (1973), p. 14.

Roy Porter, "England" in Alan Charles Kors, ed., Encyclopedia of the Enlightenment (2003) 1:409–15.

Karen O'Brien, "English Enlightenment Histories, 1750–c.1815" in José Rabasa et al. eds. (2012). The Oxford History of Historical Writing. Vol. 3: 1400–1800. OUP Oxford. pp. 518–35. ISBN 978-0-19-921917-9. {{cite book}}: |author= has generic name (help)

Roy Porter, The creation of the modern world: the untold story of the British Enlightenment (2000), pp. 1–12, 36–37, 482–84.

Rosemary Sweet, Antiquaries: the discovery of the past in eighteenth-century Britain (A&C Black, 2004).

William Li Parry-Jones, "Asylum for the mentally ill in historical perspective." Bulletin of the Royal College of Psychiatrists 12.10 (1988): 407-410 online.

Nicholas Dixon, "From Georgian to Victorian", History Review (Dec 2010), Issue 68.

Charles John Abbey, The English Church in the Eighteenth Century (1878) vol 2 p. 4.

46. "Georgian". The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (4th ed.). Archived from the original on 12 March 2008. Retrieved 4 July 2008.

External links

• Rocque's Map of London Online, 1746
• Georgians British Library history resources about the Georgian era, featuring collection material and text by Dr. Matthew White.
• British Library Timelines: Sources from History

v t e United Kingdom articles

Categories:

• Georgian era
• History of the United Kingdom by period
• Historical eras

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgian_era

Georgian architecture

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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

For the unrelated architecture of the country of Georgia, see Architecture of Georgia (country).

Middle-class house in Salisbury cathedral close, England, with minimal classical detail.

Very grand terrace houses at The Circus, Bath (1754), with basement "areas" and a profusion of columns.

Function rules at Massachusetts Hall at Harvard University, 1718-20

Georgian architecture is the name given in most English-speaking countries to the set of architectural styles current between 1714 and 1830. It is named after the first four British monarchs of the House of Hanover—George I, George II, George III, and George IV—who reigned in continuous succession from August 1714 to June 1830. The so-called great Georgian cities of the British Isles were Edinburgh, Bath, pre-independence Dublin, and London, and to a lesser extent York and Bristol.^[1] The style was revived in the late 19th century in the United States as Colonial Revival architecture and in the early 20th century in Great Britain as Neo-Georgian architecture; in both it is also called Georgian Revival architecture. In the United States the term Georgian is generally used to describe all buildings from the period, regardless of style; in Britain it is generally restricted to buildings that are "architectural in intention",^[2] and have stylistic characteristics that are typical of the period, though that covers a wide range.

The Georgian style is highly variable, but marked by symmetry and proportion based on the classical architecture of Greece and Rome, as revived in Renaissance architecture. Ornament is also normally in the classical tradition, but typically restrained, and sometimes almost completely absent on the exterior. The period brought the vocabulary of classical architecture to smaller and more modest buildings than had been the case before, replacing English vernacular architecture (or becoming the new vernacular style) for almost all new middle-class homes and public buildings by the end of the period.

Georgian architecture is characterized by its proportion and balance; simple mathematical ratios were used to determine the height of a window in relation to its width or the shape of a room as a double cube. Regularity, as with ashlar (uniformly cut) stonework, was strongly approved, imbuing symmetry and adherence to classical rules: the lack of symmetry, where Georgian additions were added to earlier structures remaining visible, was deeply felt as a flaw, at least before John Nash began to introduce it in a variety of styles.^[3] Regularity of housefronts along a street was a desirable feature of Georgian town planning. Until the start of the Gothic Revival in the early 19th century, Georgian designs usually lay within the Classical orders of architecture and employed a decorative vocabulary derived from ancient Rome or Greece.

Characteristics

In towns, which expanded greatly during the period, landowners turned into property developers, and rows of identical terraced houses became the norm.^[4] Even the wealthy were persuaded to live in these in town, especially if provided with a square of garden in front of the house. There was an enormous amount of building in the period, all over the English-speaking world, and the standards of construction were generally high. Where they have not been demolished, large numbers of Georgian buildings have survived two centuries or more, and they still form large parts of the core of cities such as London, Edinburgh, Dublin, Newcastle upon Tyne and Bristol.

The period saw the growth of a distinct and trained architectural profession; before the mid-century "the high-sounding title, 'architect' was adopted by anyone who could get away with it".^[5] This contrasted with earlier styles, which were primarily disseminated among craftsmen through the direct experience of the apprenticeship system. But most buildings were still designed by builders and landlords together, and the wide spread of Georgian architecture, and the Georgian styles of design more generally, came from dissemination through pattern books and inexpensive suites of engravings. Authors such as the prolific William Halfpenny (active 1723–1755) had editions in America as well as Britain.

A similar phenomenon can be seen in the commonality of housing designs in Canada and the United States (though of a wider variety of styles) from the 19th century down to the 1950s, using pattern books drawn up by professional architects that were distributed by lumber companies and hardware stores to contractors and homebuilders.^[6]

From the mid-18th century, Georgian styles were assimilated into an architectural vernacular that became part and parcel of the training of every architect, designer, builder, carpenter, mason and plasterer, from Edinburgh to Maryland.^[7]

Styles

Georgian succeeded the English Baroque of Sir Christopher Wren, Sir John Vanbrugh, Thomas Archer, William Talman, and Nicholas Hawksmoor; this in fact continued into at least the 1720s, overlapping with a more restrained Georgian style. The architect James Gibbs was a transitional figure, his earlier buildings are Baroque, reflecting the time he spent in Rome in the early 18th century, but he adjusted his style after 1720.^[8] Major architects to promote the change in direction from Baroque were Colen Campbell, author of the influential book Vitruvius Britannicus (1715–1725); Richard Boyle, 3rd Earl of Burlington and his protégé William Kent; Isaac Ware; Henry Flitcroft and the Venetian Giacomo Leoni, who spent most of his career in England.

Neoclassical grandeur; Stowe House 1770-79 by Robert Adam modified in execution by Thomas Pitt

Other prominent architects of the early Georgian period include James Paine, Robert Taylor, and John Wood, the Elder. The European Grand Tour became very common for wealthy patrons in the period, and Italian influence remained dominant,^[9] though at the start of the period Hanover Square, Westminster (1713 on), developed and occupied by Whig supporters of the new dynasty, seems to have deliberately adopted German stylistic elements in their honour, especially vertical bands connecting the windows.^[10]

The styles that resulted fall within several categories. In the mainstream of Georgian style were both Palladian architecture—and its whimsical alternatives, Gothic and Chinoiserie, which were the English-speaking world's equivalent of European Rococo. From the mid-1760s a range of Neoclassical modes were fashionable, associated with the British architects Robert Adam, James Gibbs, Sir William Chambers, James Wyatt, George Dance the Younger, Henry Holland and Sir John Soane. John Nash was one of the most prolific architects of the late Georgian era known as The Regency style, he was responsible for designing large areas of London.^[11] Greek Revival architecture was added to the repertory, beginning around 1750, but increasing in popularity after 1800. Leading exponents were William Wilkins and Robert Smirke.

In Britain, brick or stone are almost invariably used;^[12] brick is often disguised with stucco. The Georgian terraces of Dublin are noted for their almost uniform use of red brick, for example, whereas equivalent terraces in Edinburgh are constructed from stone.^[13] In America and other colonies wood remained very common, as its availability and cost-ratio with the other materials was more favourable. Raked roofs were mostly covered in earthenware tiles until Richard Pennant, 1st Baron Penrhyn led the development of the slate industry in Wales from the 1760s, which by the end of the century had become the usual material.^[14]

Types of buildings

Houses

Westover Plantation - Georgian country house on a James River plantation in Virginia

Versions of revived Palladian architecture dominated English country house architecture. Houses were increasingly placed in grand landscaped settings, and large houses were generally made wide and relatively shallow, largely to look more impressive from a distance. The height was usually highest in the centre, and the Baroque emphasis on corner pavilions often found on the continent generally avoided. In grand houses, an entrance hall led to steps up to a piano nobile or mezzanine floor where the main reception rooms were. Typically the basement area or "rustic", with kitchens, offices and service areas, as well as male guests with muddy boots,^[15] came some way above ground, and was lit by windows that were high on the inside, but just above ground level outside. A single block was typical, with perhaps a small court for carriages at the front marked off by railings and a gate, but rarely a stone gatehouse, or side wings around the court.

Windows in all types of buildings were large and regularly placed on a grid; this was partly to minimize window tax, which was in force throughout the period in the United Kingdom. Some windows were subsequently bricked-in. Their height increasingly varied between the floors, and they increasingly began below waist-height in the main rooms, making a small balcony desirable. Before this the internal plan and function of the rooms can generally not be deduced from the outside. To open these large windows the sash window, already developed by the 1670s, became very widespread.^[16] Corridor plans became universal inside larger houses.^[17]

Internal courtyards became more rare, except beside the stables, and the functional parts of the building were placed at the sides, or in separate buildings nearby hidden by trees. The views to and from the front and rear of the main block were concentrated on, with the side approaches usually much less important. The roof was typically invisible from the ground, though domes were sometimes visible in grander buildings. The roofline was generally clear of ornament except for a balustrade or the top of a pediment.^[18] Columns or pilasters, often topped by a pediment, were popular for ornament inside and out,^[19] and other ornament was generally geometrical or plant-based, rather than using the human figure.

Grand Neoclassical interior by Robert Adam, Syon House, London

Inside ornament was far more generous, and could sometimes be overwhelming.^[20] The chimneypiece continued to be the usual main focus of rooms, and was now given a classical treatment, and increasingly topped by a painting or a mirror.^[21] Plasterwork ceilings,^[22] carved wood, and bold schemes of wallpaint formed a backdrop to increasingly rich collections of furniture, paintings, porcelain, mirrors, and objets d'art of all kinds.^[23] Wood-panelling, very common since about 1500, fell from favour around the mid-century, and wallpaper included very expensive imports from China.^[24]

Smaller houses in the country, such as vicarages, were simple regular blocks with visible raked roofs, and a central doorway, often the only ornamented area. Similar houses, often referred to as "villas" became common around the fringes of the larger cities, especially London,^[25] and detached houses in towns remained common, though only the very rich could afford them in central London.

In towns even most better-off people lived in terraced houses, which typically opened straight onto the street, often with a few steps up to the door. There was often an open space, protected by iron railings, dropping down to the basement level, with a discreet entrance down steps off the street for servants and deliveries; this is known as the "area".^[26] This meant that the ground floor front was now removed and protected from the street and encouraged the main reception rooms to move there from the floor above. Often, when a new street or set of streets was developed, the road and pavements were raised up, and the gardens or yards behind the houses remained at a lower level, usually representing the original one.^[27]

Georgian townhouses on Baggot Street, Dublin

Town terraced houses for all social classes remained resolutely tall and narrow, each dwelling occupying the whole height of the building. This contrasted with well-off continental dwellings, which had already begun to be formed of wide apartments occupying only one or two floors of a building; such arrangements were only typical in England when housing groups of batchelors, as in Oxbridge colleges, the lawyers in the Inns of Court or The Albany after it was converted in 1802.^[28] In the period in question, only in Edinburgh were working-class purpose-built tenements common, though lodgers were common in other cities. A curving crescent, often looking out at gardens or a park, was popular for terraces where space allowed. In early and central schemes of development, plots were sold and built on individually, though there was often an attempt to enforce some uniformity,^[29] but as development reached further out schemes were increasingly built as a uniform scheme and then sold.^[30]

The late Georgian period saw the birth of the semi-detached house, planned systematically, as a suburban compromise between the terraced houses of the city and the detached "villas" further out, where land was cheaper. There had been occasional examples in town centres going back to medieval times. Most early suburban examples are large, and in what are now the outer fringes of Central London, but were then in areas being built up for the first time. Blackheath, Chalk Farm and St John's Wood are among the areas contesting being the original home of the semi.^[31] Sir John Summerson gave primacy to the Eyre Estate of St John's Wood. A plan for this exists dated 1794, where "the whole development consists of pairs of semi-detached houses, So far as I know, this is the first recorded scheme of the kind". In fact the French Wars put an end to this scheme, but when the development was finally built it retained the semi-detached form, "a revolution of striking significance and far-reaching effect".^[32]

Churches

St Martin-in-the-Fields, London (1720), James Gibbs

The courtyard of Somerset House, from the North Wing entrance. Built for government offices.

Until the Church Building Act 1818, the period saw relatively few churches built in Britain, which was already well-supplied,^[33] although in the later years of the period the demand for Non-conformist and Roman Catholic places of worship greatly increased.^[34] Anglican churches that were built were designed internally to allow maximum audibility, and visibility, for preaching, so the main nave was generally wider and shorter than in medieval plans, and often there were no side-aisles. Galleries were common in new churches. Especially in country parishes, the external appearance generally retained the familiar signifiers of a Gothic church, with a tower or spire, a large west front with one or more doors, and very large windows along the nave, but all with any ornament drawn from the classical vocabulary. Where funds permitted, a classical temple portico with columns and a pediment might be used at the west front. Interior decoration was generally chaste; however, walls often became lined with plaques and monuments to the more prosperous members of the congregation.^[35]

In the colonies new churches were certainly required, and generally repeated similar formulae. British Non-conformist churches were often more classical in mood, and tended not to feel the need for a tower or steeple.

The archetypal Georgian church is St Martin-in-the-Fields in London (1720), by Gibbs, who boldly added to the classical temple façade at the west end a large steeple on top of a tower, set back slightly from the main frontage. This formula shocked purists and foreigners, but became accepted and was very widely emulated, at home and in the colonies,^[36] for example at St Andrew's Church, Chennai in India. And in Dublin, the extremely similar St. George's Church, Dublin.

The 1818 Act allocated some public money for new churches required to reflect changes in population, and a commission to allocate it. Building of Commissioners' churches gathered pace in the 1820s, and continued until the 1850s. The early churches, falling into the Georgian period, show a high proportion of Gothic Revival buildings, along with the classically inspired.^[37]

Public buildings

Public buildings generally varied between the extremes of plain boxes with grid windows and Italian Late Renaissance palaces, depending on budget. Somerset House in London, designed by Sir William Chambers in 1776 for government offices, was as magnificent as any country house, though never quite finished, as funds ran out.^[38] Barracks and other less prestigious buildings could be as functional as the mills and factories that were growing increasingly large by the end of the period. But as the period came to an end many commercial projects were becoming sufficiently large, and well-funded, to become "architectural in intention", rather than having their design left to the lesser class of "surveyors".^[39]

Colonial Georgian architecture

See also: Federal architecture

Hyde Park Barracks (1819), Georgian architecture in Sydney

Georgian architecture was widely disseminated in the English colonies during the Georgian era. American buildings of the Georgian period were very often constructed of wood with clapboards; even columns were made of timber, framed up, and turned on an oversized lathe. At the start of the period the difficulties of obtaining and transporting brick or stone made them a common alternative only in the larger cities, or where they were obtainable locally. Dartmouth College, Harvard University and the College of William and Mary offer leading examples of Georgian architecture in the Americas.

Unlike the Baroque style that it replaced, which was mostly used for palaces and churches, and had little representation in the British colonies, simpler Georgian styles were widely used by the upper and middle classes. Perhaps the best remaining house is the pristine Hammond-Harwood House (1774) in Annapolis, Maryland, designed by the colonial architect William Buckland and modelled on the Villa Pisani at Montagnana, Italy as depicted in Andrea Palladio's I quattro libri dell'architettura ("The Four Books of Architecture").

After independence, in the former American colonies, Federal-style architecture represented the equivalent of Regency architecture, with which it had much in common.

In Canada, the United Empire Loyalists embraced Georgian architecture as a sign of their fealty to Britain, and the Georgian style was dominant in the country for most of the first half of the 19th century. The Grange, for example, is a Georgian manor built in Toronto in 1817. In Montreal, English-born architect John Ostell worked on a significant number of remarkable constructions in the Georgian style such as the Old Montreal Custom House and the Grand séminaire de Montréal.

In Australia, the Old Colonial Georgian residential and non-residential styles were developed in the period from c. 1810 – c. 1840.

Post-Georgian developments

See also: Colonial Revival architecture

Winfield House in London was designed and built in the 1930s and is listed by Historic England as an important Neo-Georgian townhouse

After about 1840, Georgian conventions were slowly abandoned as a number of revival styles, including Gothic Revival, that had originated in the Georgian period, developed and contested in Victorian architecture, and in the case of Gothic became better researched, and closer to their originals. Neoclassical architecture remained popular, and was the opponent of Gothic in the Battle of the Styles of the early Victorian period. In the United States the Federalist Style contained many elements of Georgian style, but incorporated revolutionary symbols.

In the early decades of the twentieth century when there was a growing nostalgia for its sense of order, the style was revived and adapted and in the United States came to be known as the Colonial Revival. The revived Georgian style that emerged in Britain during the same period is usually referred to as Neo-Georgian; the work of Edwin Lutyens^[40][41] and Vincent Harris includes some examples. The British town of Welwyn Garden City, established in the 1920s, is an example of pastiche or Neo-Georgian development of the early 20th century in Britain. Versions of the Neo-Georgian style were commonly used in Britain for certain types of urban architecture until the late 1950s, Bradshaw Gass & Hope's Police Headquarters in Salford of 1958 being a good example. Architects such as Raymond Erith, and Donald McMorran were among the few architects who continued the neo-Georgian style into the 1960s. Both in the United States and Britain, the Georgian style is still employed by architects like Quinlan Terry, Julian Bicknell, Ben Pentreath, Robert Adam Architects, and Fairfax and Sammons for private residences. A debased form in commercial housing developments, especially in the suburbs, is known in the UK as mock-Georgian.

Gallery

• 

  Ditchley House in Oxfordshire, a country house. James Gibbs, 1722

• 

  Connecticut Hall at Yale University, a relatively unornamented iteration of the Georgian style (1750)

• 

  Sutton Lodge, Sutton, London, once used by the Prince Regent, George IV of the United Kingdom^[42]

• 

  Georgian period townhouses in Pery Square, Newtown Pery, Limerick, Ireland, after 1769

• 

  Kedleston Hall by Matthew Brettingham and Robert Adam, begun 1769, a large English country house

• 

  One of Robert Adam's masterpieces, in a largely Georgian setting: Pulteney Bridge, Bath, 1774

• 

  Carpenters' Hall in Philadelphia by Robert Smith, 1775 example of American colonial architecture

• 

  Royal Exchange, Dublin, 1779

• 

  A former guildhall in Dunfermline, Scotland built between 1805 and 1811

• 

  University Hall of Harvard University by Charles Bulfinch (1815), exemplary of Georgian ornamental restraint

• 

  Western side of Bryanston Square, London, with its gardens. 1810-15

• 

  Late Georgian Regency; the west curve of Park Crescent, London, by John Nash, 1806–21

• 

  The Grange, a Georgian manor in Toronto built for D'Arcy Boulton in 1817

• 

  St James' Church, Sydney in Colonial Georgian architecture, built in 1824

• 

  Neo-Georgian - Chesterfield Town Hall (1938), Derbyshire, by Bradshaw Gass & Hope

• 

  Rose Terrace, Perth, Scotland

See also

• Architecture portal

• Golden ratio
• Jamaican Georgian architecture
• Canning, Liverpool
• Clifton, Bristol
• Georgian Dublin
• Grainger Town, Newcastle upon Tyne
• New Town, Edinburgh, an 18th- and 19th-century development that contains some of the largest surviving examples of Georgian-style architecture and layout.
• Newtown Pery, Limerick
• The Georgian Group

Notes

1. 
   

St John Parker, Michael. (2013). Life in Georgian Britain. Gloucestershire: Pitkin Publishing. ISBN 9780752491622. Retrieved 3 May 2021.

A phrase used by John Summerson, distinguishing among commercial buildings, Summerson, 252

Musson, 33–34, 52–53

Summerson, 26–28, 73–86

Summerson, 47–49, 47 quoted

Reiff, Daniel D. (2001). Houses from Books. University Park, Pa.: Penn State University Press. ISBN 9780271019437. Retrieved 28 February 2017.

Summerson, 49–51; The Center for Palladian Studies in America, Inc., "Palladio and Patternbooks in Colonial America." Archived 2009-12-23 at the Wayback Machine

Summerson, 61–70, and see index

Jenkins (2003), xiv; Musson, 31

Summerson, 73–74

Summerson, see index on all these; Jenkins (2003), xv–xiv; Musson, 28–35

Summerson, 54–56

"Bricks - their part in the rise of man". The Irish Times.

Summerson, 55

Musson, 31; Jenkins (2003), xiv

Musson, 73-76; Summerson, 46

Bannister Fletcher, 420

Musson, 51; Bannister Fletcher, 420

Bannister Fletcher, 420

Jenkins (2003), xv; Musson, 31

Musson, 84–87

Musson, 113–116

Jenkins (2003), xv

Musson, 101–106

Summerson, 266–269

Summerson, 44–45

Summerson, 44–45

Summerson, 45

Summerson, 73–86

Summerson, 147–191

correspondence in The Guardian

Summerson, 159-160

Summerson, 57–72, 206–224; Jenkins (1999), xxii

Summerson, 222–224

Jenkins (1999), xx–xxii

Summerson, 64–70

Summerson, 212-221

Summerson, 115–120

Summerson, 47, 252–262, 252 quoted

Elizabeth McKellar, Professor of Architectural and Design History at the Open University (30 September 2016). "You Didn't Know it was Neo-Georgian".

"New Book Neo-Georgian Architecture 1880-1970: A Reappraisal by Julian Holder and Elizabeth". lutyenstrust.

42. "Sutton Lodge Day Centre website". Archived from the original on 2014-10-16. Retrieved 2015-08-12.

References

• Fletcher, Banister and Fletcher, Banister, A History of Architecture, 1901 edn., Batsford
• Esher, Lionel, The Glory of the English House, 1991, Barrie and Jenkins, ISBN 0712636137
• Jenkins, Simon (1999), England's Thousand Best Churches, 1999, Allen Lane, ISBN 0-7139-9281-6
• Jenkins, Simon (2003), England's Thousand Best Houses, 2003, Allen Lane, ISBN 0-7139-9596-3
• Musson, Jeremy, How to Read a Country House, 2005, Ebury Press, ISBN 009190076X
• Pevsner, Nikolaus. The Englishness of English Art, Penguin, 1964 edn.
• Sir John Summerson, Georgian London (1945), 1988 revised edition, Barrie & Jenkins, ISBN 0712620958. (Also see revised edition, edited by Howard Colvin, 2003)

Further reading

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Georgian architecture.

• Howard Colvin, A Biographical Dictionary of British Architects, 3rd ed., 1995.
• John Cornforth, Early Georgian Interiors (Paul Mellon Centre), 2005.
• James Stevens Curl, Georgian Architecture.
• Christopher Hussey, Early Georgian Houses, Mid-Georgian Houses, Late Georgian Houses. Reissued in paperback, Antique Collectors Club, 1986.
• Frank Jenkins, Architect and Patron, 1961.
• Barrington Kaye, The Development of the Architectural Profession in Britain, 1960.
• McAlester, Virginia & Lee, A Field Guide to American Houses, 1996. ISBN 0-394-73969-8.
• Sir John Summerson, Architecture in Britain (series: Pelican History of Art). Reissued in paperback 1970.
• Richard Sammons, The Anatomy of the Georgian Room. Period Homes, March 2006.

v t e Architecture of England

v t e Architecture of the United States

Categories:

• Georgian architecture
• Architectural styles
• British architectural styles
• House styles
• American architectural styles
• 18th-century architectural styles
• 19th-century architecture

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgian_architecture