The Black Sea in the mythological cosmography and everyday life of the Georgians
The Black Sea in the mythological cosmography and everyday life of the Georgians

Author(s): Nino Abakelia
Subject(s): Anthropology, Social Sciences, Customs / Folklore, Geography, Regional studies, Human Geography, Cultural Anthropology / Ethnology
Published by: Сдружение „Транспонтика“
Keywords: mythological cosmography; everyday life; Mother of the Sea; Patroness of Beasts; paradise
Summary/Abstract: The Georgians belong to those people who associate their historical and mythological memory to the Black Sea and who embed it in a particular locus at the periphery of their mythological cosmography. The present article focuses on the female personification of the Black Sea called zghvis nene (lit. the Mother of the Sea), her thiasos (male and female anthropomorphic creatures), called mesepebi, and their mythology in Georgian cultural practice. Marine mythology abundant in symbols provides a semiotic context for mythic discourse. The mentioned marine symbols are discussed from a spatiotemporal perspective, which in turn is based on cosmological symbolism. The paper shows how the Black Sea (as a cosmic zone) symbolically organises the space of the worldview of Georgians and how it forms the icon of the ordered place. Seen from the structural semantics approach, the organised world (fenced in with and limited by temporal, spatial and causal factors) is associated with the inner world (society) and the unordered world (nature). It shows how the marine personages (or “cycling guests”, as the author defines them) impact and influence the well-being of the society when they arrive on the shore from the s/Sea to visit the living annually, at one and the same time (in October-November, when their powers are thought to be strongest). In the Georgian mythological tradition the Black Sea is preferably associated with the female principle – zghvis nene; according to her attributes (sceptre and black miraculous dog) and functions, she is compared to the other cosmicising Mother – the Patroness of the Beasts. The marine realm is also associated with the garden of the so called Batonebi (lit. the Adonai / the Lords – the spirits of the infectious diseases), the description of which alludes to the Garden of Eden, etc. Highly charged with religious symbolism, the Mother of the Sea (zghvis nene), her attendants (mesepeni) and other personages of the sea reveal cosmic symbolism that in turn reflects the mainstay of symbolic thought of Georgians. The article tries to show how the basic male and female symbolism of the marine inhabitants corresponds to the symbolism of the gendered landscapes and how everyday life changes through ritual into an autumn mythic-ritual scenario and how the surrounding societal environment is being mythologised.

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