leqsebi

VIOLET ON THE MOUNTAIN
35. Mze shina da mze gareta (“Sun inside and sun outside”). Source: MP 80-81. Recorded by Sev.
Gachechiladze in Imereti. Musical setting: MFS #43 (monophonic lullaby, in 6/8 meter). This is one
of the best known Georgian folksongs, and numerous versions have been collected and published
[notes and variants in MP 170-6]. Most variants, unlike the one printed in this anthology, celebrate
the birth of a male child:
Sun inside and sun outside, O Sun come on inside!
The rooster has already crowed, O Sun come on inside!
Rise if you will rise at all, “ “
The sun lay down and bore the moon, “ “
A baby boy has been born to us, “ “
Our enemy thinks it is a girl, “ “
The boy’s father is not at home, “ “
He has gone to town to get a cradle, “ “
etc. etc. [Ko 25-6]
In Chikovani’s opinion [MP 171-2; see also DGF II, 25], this poem was originally a hymn to the
sun-goddess, later reworked as either a lullaby or a spinning song, as in the version given here .
36. Suletis leksi (“The land of souls”). Source: Ko 289-90; variant in MT 189-90. Recited by S.
Tsisk’arashvili in the Tushetian village Alaznis Tavi. The traditional Georgian belief concerning the
afterlife is not greatly different from that of the Greeks of Homer’s time. Suleti, “the land of souls,”
is a dank, cheerless place, illuminated by a dim light, similar to the last rays of the sun at dusk, called
“the sun of the dead” (mk’wdris mze). Entering souls must pass over a giant cauldron of boiling
water on a tightrope made of hair. The souls of sinful persons are heavier, and thus more likely to
fall into the cauldron [CD 58-62; DGF 94; note the similarity to the Chinwad bridge of ancient
Iranian religion, which widens or narrows depending on the sinfulness of the soul entering the
afterlife]. The souls of the deceased retain many of the characteristics they had at the time of death
(age and infirmity, for example), but at the same time are shadows of their former selves. They
speak, if at all, very softly. A large banquet is spread before them, but they do not actually eat the
food, merely gaze at it. Nonetheless food and drink are essential for the souls’ well-being, and it can
be supplied only through sacrifices and libations made by their living relatives. Souls that are not
provided for in this way cannot participate in the banquet, and must “sit with their backs toward the
table.”
37. Mirangula (“Mirangula”). Source: SvP 6-13; variant in SbMat XVIII. Narrated by Giorgi Kharziani
in 1927 in the Upper Svan village K’ala. Transcribed by V. Topuria. Musical setting: HGF #34
(three-voice male chorus accompanied by the harp (changi) and viol (ch’uniri), in 4/4 meter).
Mirangula has been kept by his mother in the defense tower (murq’wam) that adjoins almost every
Upper Svan homestead. The variant in SbMat states that he was keeping watch, while the later text
in SvP says that his mother “spoiled” him (naunkholosh khordæs) by making him stay there.
Whatever the case may be, Mirangula leaves the tower to go on a raid in Balkaria (in Svan,
Malq’ar), the province on the other (north) side of the main ridge of the Caucasus. He crosses the
pass on Machkhpar (“waterfall”) Mountain, which links Ushgul, the easternmost and uppermost
Svan village, with Balkaria. Mirangula kills a herdsman and captures his oxen. He is pursued by the
“Savs” (sævær), a Svan corruption of a word meaning “Ossetian,” but which is applied
indiscriminately to Balkarians and other North Caucasians. The North Caucasians are nominally
Muslims, and the Svans, like most other Georgians, are nominally Orthodox Christian. After he
shoots a party of men, a group of Sav women comes after him. Mirangula finds them offensive. In
the SbMat variant he terms them “unclean and unbelievers”; in the version translated here he
specifies that they do not wear the lachæk, the wimple-like headdress traditionally worn by Georgian
women, nor underwear (arshwil). This latter remark probably reflects the special fear male that
Caucasian mountaineers have of being “contaminated” by menstrual blood [ONS 140]. A certain
Sav named Vezden heads off Mirangula at the pass and guns him down (literally, “rolls him over”
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