წურწუმია, მამუკა / Tsurtsumia, Mamuka2025-01-172025-01-172024ივანე ჯავახიშვილის სახელობის თბილისის სახელმწიფო უნივერსიტეტის საქართველოს ისტორიის ინსტიტუტის შრომები, XX, თბილისი, 2024, გვ. 67-81 / Ivane Javakhishvili Tbilisi State University Institute of Georgian History Proceedings, XX, Tbilisi, 2024, p. 67-811987–9970https://dspace.tsu.ge/handle/123456789/2579https://geohistory.humanities.tsu.ge/ge/procedings/83-shromebi/179-shromebi-20.html ივანე ჯავახიშვილის სახელობის თბილისის სახელმწიფო უნივერსიტეტის ჰუმანიტარულ მეცნიერებათა ფაკულტეტის საქართველოს ისტორიის ინსტიტუტის შრომები შესულია ERIH PLUS-ში (The European Reference Index for the Humanities and the Social Sciences) / This journal was approved on 23.10.2024 according to ERIH PLUS criteria for inclusionIn the anonymous work Interets et maximes des princes & des estats souverains, published in Cologne in 1666, there is interesting information about the Georgian state symbol in the Middle Ages. According to this work, Georgians used the Jerusalem cross as their coat of arms. The significance of this information is particularly noteworthy, given the scarcity of narrative data regarding the Georgians’ use of the five-cross flag, unless we consider the data from the Portolan sea charts that are still under discussion to date. The aforementioned work is attributed to Henri de Rohan (1579-1638), the Duke of Rohan and Prince of Lyons, who belonged to one of the oldest noble French families. Surrounded by intellectuals and scholars since childhood, Henri prepared for a military career and participated in military campaigns from the age of 18. In his youth, he extensively traveled, visiting Germany, Italy, Austria, Hungary, the Netherlands, England, and Scotland between 1599 and 1601. After the death of King Henri IV of France (1589-1610), Henri de Rohan became the leader of the French Calvinist Protestants (Huguenots). He opposed the royal throne three times with arms in hand when it began to oppress the Huguenots. This series of rebellions is sometimes referred to as the Rohan Wars. After the defeat of the rebellion, de Rohan was forced to seek refuge in Venice. During the Thirty Years’ War (1618-48), France required his services again. In 1631, at Richelieu’s request, he was assigned to guard the Valtellina Pass in Lombardy. In 1635, Henri de Rohan simultaneously fought the Spanish and Austrian armies, defeating them four times in a row. In 1636, de Rohan shifted hostilities to the Lombardy region, defeating the Spaniards for the fifth time, capturing Lake Como, and opening the way to Milan. He met his end in 1638, mortally wounded in the Battle of Reinfelden while fighting alongside the Saxons, allies of France. Henri de Rohan is rightly considered one of the greatest military commanders of the 17th century. During three civil wars, always outnumbered, he resisted the army of one of the most powerful kingdoms in Europe. In Italy, he defeated the armies of the Holy Roman Empire and Spain five times. He was also a prolific writer, producing memoir literature such as Voyage du duc de Rohan and Mémoires du duc de Rohan, as well as military and political treatises like Le Parfait Capitaine and De l’intérêt des princes et états de la chrétienté. During his travels, Henri de Rohan acquainted himself with the ruling circles of Europe and gained insight into their interests, contributing to an adequate understanding of the geopolitical reality of the era. His work De l’intérêt des princes et états de la chrétienté is a groundbreaking study of the driving forces of political life. De Rohan was the first European writer to develop a theory of self-interest as a guiding force in human activity. Henri, an educated man, corresponded with European intellectuals and carried part of his personal library on his travels. His writings are considered the best examples of 17th-century memoir genre literature. A man of “pen and sword,” as Pierre and Solange Deyon called him, and to whose death Voltaire dedicated an epitaph, “Henri de Rohan belonged to those great commanders who possessed both the qualities of Caesar, the art of winning and the art of writing.” Considering that history was Henri de Rohan’s main intellectual pursuit since childhood, it is not surprising that he had insight into the affairs of Eastern Christianity. During his exile, Rohan even planned to purchase the island of Cyprus from the Ottomans and had connections with Patriarch Kirill of Constantinople. Cyprus and the East appealed to him due to his connection with the Lusignans, whose ancestry he proudly acknowledged. The references to Georgia in Interets et maximes des princes & des estats souverains are likely manifestations of these interests, where he attempted to explain how the five crosses of Jerusalem appeared on the Georgian flag. This fact itself appears to have been known to Europeans for a long time.otherArticle