ტრადიციული ქართული მოტივები შავშურ ფოლკლორში

Abstract

A permanent complex expedition of scholars worked in the territory of historical Georgia in Shavsheti in 2005-2010, which included the scientists of Batumi Shota Rustaveli University. They worked in the so-called Georgian and Turkish villages of Shavsheti and collected folklore, dialectological, ethnological materials, which were later reflected in scientific publications. Folk material recorded in Shavsheti includes household, ritual, as well as love poems and spells. Narratives of historical and mythological content, in which motifs known in Georgian folklore are repeated, are also noteworthy. Such are the legends about Queen Tamar and the stone men. As in Georgia, the rituals performed with these megalithic monuments are related to weather management. Observations on the material obtained in Shavsheti show that folklore retains its ability to live for a long time and traditional motifs remain in people’s memory, but being torn from ethnic and religious grounds loses its creative impulse and its artistic quality also becomes lower.