leqsebi

ia mtazeda
64. Eter, shen silamazita (“Eter, with your beauty”). Source: PKh 208. Recited by N. Khornauli in the
Pshavian village Magraneti in 1939 .
65. Aksha, aksha, mamalo (“Aksha, aksha, rooster, scram”). Source: PKh 208. Recited by N.
Khornauli in Magraneti in 1939 .
66. Zghvashi shatsurda k’urdgheli (“A rabbit swam into the sea”). Source: PKh 209. Recited by El.
Elisbarashvili in the Pshavian village Shuapkho in 1946. Variants in OL 45 #65 and 63 #167.
According to the Kartlian variants in OL (collected ca. 1880), the poet is spun around “like a
whetstone” (kharat’ivita).
67. Net’ain mamk’la mtashia (“May I die in the mountains”). Source: PKh 216. Recited by Ioseb
Udzilauri in the Khevsur village Kvemo Kedi in 1946 .
68. Tval k’i mich’erav shenzeda (“I have an eye on you”). Source: PKh 216. Recited by N.
Elisbarashvili in the Pshavian village Shuapkho in 1940. Variants in LP 49, 174 .
69. Nadobis k’abas vapere (“I likened it to my sister-spouse’s dress”). Source: PKh 206. Narrated by
K’ok’o Udzilauri in 1938 in the Kakhetian village P’ank’isi. Variants in LP 129, 300. The central
idea of the poem is conveyed by an omen, which Z. K’ik’nadze unravelled for me as follows: The
shepherd is tending his flocks in the summer grazing lands. A butterfly appears, a messenger from
the land of souls. The butterfly’s coloration reminds him of the dress worn by the woman with whom
he had contracted a bond of ts’ats’loba, which can be read as an omen that she has died. The
shepherd begs God that the omen not be true, and tells the butterfly to pass on some good news (his
sheep are doing well) to his sister-spouse, wherever she is.
70. Dghe tu ghame (“Day or night”). Source: Go 144-6. Variants in ShKh 143-144, 518-520; FY 139-
140; SR 97-8 (in French). I will just touch on two details in the poem that require amplification:
First, the straw upon which the young couple are enjoying themselves is probably inside a stable.
The Caucasian mountain tribes used to have the practice, found in many parts of the world, of
secluding women from the rest of the family during times of blood flow: childbirth and menstruation
[ONS 140]. In some areas (for example Khevsureti) the women retreated to a special hut (samrelo);
in Pshavi the stable fulfilled this role. Given the extremely grave consequences that an illegitimate
child would bring crashing down on their heads, the young ts’ats’lebi usually confined their lovemaking
to this time of the month, when the risk of pregnancy was at a minimum. The poem also
contains a reference to a bottle of vodka, which the woman brings with her to the tryst in the stable.
This calls to mind a ritual observed in Svaneti at the end of the last century: The couple forming a
bond of lintural (the Svanetian equivalent of ts’ats’loba) seal their new relationship by invoking
God’s blessing and drinking cups of vodka, as a sign that this bond was sanctioned by heaven as
well as the community.
140