Konrad and Alexandra (pdf) - Rolf Gross

the old crone whacking the backs of the young men with her stick cackling obscenities.
Everyone loved it, and Konrad also received a beating.
"To the foreigner with the red beard!" said the old woman in German.
Konrad was stunned but collected himself and shouted at her in Georgian: "Go to hell,
old witch!"
Which, to everybody’s amusement, earned him two more whacks.
Konrad suggested they wait for Deda, but Alexandra refused to stay. "I don’t want to
meet Persephone, and right now not even my mother. Please, let’s walk down. Olga is waiting
for us at the Easter feast. I would like to forget this heathen scene."
As they walked, Konrad tried to clear his mind. He was deeply moved by the complex
symbolism in which he discovered several references to the Greek tragedies and the Eleusian
Mysteries.
The Old Crone had, he was certain, been borrowed from of the Greek tragedies where
she was a standard character, most often the leader of the chorus, who with her sharp tongue
and nasty jokes commented on the play and exposed actors and audience alike.
Alexandra listened to his ramblings but remained mute.
He was less certain about the origins of the female triad, but remembered a description
in Pausanias’ Travels in Greece of such a trio. In Arkadia Pausanias had heard of a horrifyingly
archaic mystery play reserved for women in which the triad was, just as here, Demeter, Kore
as the virgin Maiden, and a horse-headed Yakkhos. Both, the misbegotten Yakkhos and the
lovely Kore were the offspring of rapes of Demeter by Zeus.
Later Hades raped Kore in Arkadia, where she had fallen asleep in a meadow of
poppies, and abducted her to the underworld. Demeter searched wide and far for her
disappeared daughter. When all-seeing Helios told her of Kore’s abduction, she forced Zeus to
allow Kore to spend nine months above ground, however, during winter Kore had to live in the
underworld as Persephone, the Queen of Hades.
Persephone’s resurrection in spring had been celebrated in mystery plays in many
places in Greece and its colonies. Eleusis was only the most famous example. But the
anthropologists knew few details. The participants of these festivities were sworn to silence.
In Greece the Mysteries were obliterated by Christianity in the third century. But on the
shores of the Black Sea they might have survived much longer and provided the basis for this
hybrid play. After all, he argued, both Kore’s and Christ’s resurrection were based on very
similar shepherd’s myths.
Konrad shook his head. "This is a most intriguing discovery. It is a pity that I am not an
anthropologist, the publication of this mystery play would create a sensation."
He turned to his taciturn betrothed and said gently. "I can understand that you are
pursued by very different thoughts. Thank you for coming with me. I am sorry that the
discovery of Deda in this play caused you such anguish. Consider it as theater with a religious
meaning, why should she not participate in it? There are many worse plays being performed
today, and her role as Demeter/Mother of God is surely the most honorable of the three. Even
if the bloody cloth was revolting."
The smell of roasting lamb wafted through the house in Zaguramo. The big table was
decorated with flowers and bowls of dyed red eggs. The other family members were already
home and mobbed Konrad and Alexandra with questions. "Where is Tamara?" asked Irakli
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