Ivane Javakhishvili (April 11, 1876 – November 18, 1940) was a
GeorgianGeorgia Georgia Georgia is a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia. Situated at the juncture of Western Asia and Eastern Europe, it is bounded to the west by the Black Sea, to the north by Russia, to the south by Turkey and Armenia, and to the east by Azerbaijan...
historian whose voluminous works heavily influenced the
modern scholarshipThe Kartvelian studies, or Kartvelology is a field of humanities covering Kartvelian history, languages, religion and/or culture....
of the
historyThe history of Georgia began with the rise of the early Georgian states of Colchis and Iberia, which c. 1000 BC formed the Georgian civilization and achieved its renaissance and golden age in the twelfth through thirteenth centuries...
and culture of Georgia. He was also one of the founding fathers of the
Tbilisi State UniversityTbilisi Ivane Javakhishvili State University, better known as Tbilisi State University , is a university established on 8 February, 1918 in Tbilisi, Georgia. TSU is the oldest university in the whole Caucasus region...
(1918) and its
rectorThe word rector has a number of different meanings; they indicate an academic, religious or political administrator...
from 1919 to 1926.
Javakhishvili was born in
TbilisiTbilisi is the capital and the largest city of Georgia, lying on the banks of the Mt'k'vari River. The name is derived from an early Georgian form Tp'ilisi and it was officially known as Tiflis until 1936...
,
GeorgiaGeorgia Georgia Georgia is a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia. Situated at the juncture of Western Asia and Eastern Europe, it is bounded to the west by the Black Sea, to the north by Russia, to the south by Turkey and Armenia, and to the east by Azerbaijan...
(then part of
Imperial RussiaThe Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was the successor to the Tsardom of Russia, and the predecessor of the Soviet Union...
) to an aristocratic family of Alexander Javakhishvili, who served as an educator at the Tbilisi Gymnasium.
Ivane Javakhishvili (April 11, 1876 – November 18, 1940) was a
GeorgianGeorgia Georgia Georgia is a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia. Situated at the juncture of Western Asia and Eastern Europe, it is bounded to the west by the Black Sea, to the north by Russia, to the south by Turkey and Armenia, and to the east by Azerbaijan...
historian whose voluminous works heavily influenced the
modern scholarshipThe Kartvelian studies, or Kartvelology is a field of humanities covering Kartvelian history, languages, religion and/or culture....
of the
historyThe history of Georgia began with the rise of the early Georgian states of Colchis and Iberia, which c. 1000 BC formed the Georgian civilization and achieved its renaissance and golden age in the twelfth through thirteenth centuries...
and culture of Georgia. He was also one of the founding fathers of the
Tbilisi State UniversityTbilisi Ivane Javakhishvili State University, better known as Tbilisi State University , is a university established on 8 February, 1918 in Tbilisi, Georgia. TSU is the oldest university in the whole Caucasus region...
(1918) and its
rectorThe word rector has a number of different meanings; they indicate an academic, religious or political administrator...
from 1919 to 1926.
Biography
Javakhishvili was born in
TbilisiTbilisi is the capital and the largest city of Georgia, lying on the banks of the Mt'k'vari River. The name is derived from an early Georgian form Tp'ilisi and it was officially known as Tiflis until 1936...
,
GeorgiaGeorgia Georgia Georgia is a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia. Situated at the juncture of Western Asia and Eastern Europe, it is bounded to the west by the Black Sea, to the north by Russia, to the south by Turkey and Armenia, and to the east by Azerbaijan...
(then part of
Imperial RussiaThe Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was the successor to the Tsardom of Russia, and the predecessor of the Soviet Union...
) to an aristocratic family of Alexander Javakhishvili, who served as an educator at the Tbilisi Gymnasium. Having graduated from the Faculty of
Oriental StudiesOriental studies is the academic field of study that embraces Near Eastern and Far Eastern societies and cultures, languages, peoples, history and archaeology; in recent years the term Asian studies has mostly replaced the older term. European study of the region had primarily religious origins,...
of the St. Petersburg University in 1899, he became there a
privat-docent at the Chair of
ArmenianThe Armenian language is an Indo-European language spoken by the Armenian people. It is the official language of the Republic of Armenia as well as in the region of Nagorno-Karabakh. The language is also widely spoken by Armenian communities in the Armenian diaspora...
and Georgian Philology. From 1901 to 1902, he was a visiting scholar at the University of Berlin. In 1902, he accompanied his mentor, Academician
Niko MarrNicholas Marr was a Georgia-born historian and linguist who gained a solid reputation as a prolific scholar of the Caucasus before embarking on his controversial monogenetic theory of language and the related speculative linguistic hypotheses which constituted the officially...
, to
Mount SinaiMount Sinai , also known as Mount Horeb, Mount Musa, Gabal Musa , Jabal Musa by the Bedouin, is the name of a mountain in Saint Katherine city, in the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt...
where they studied medieval Georgian manuscripts. After the first volumes of Javakhishvili's monumental, but yet unfinished,
kartveli eris istoria (A History of the Georgian Nation) appeared between 1908 and 1914, the young scholar quickly established himself as a preeminent authority on Georgian and
CaucasianThe Caucasus or Caucas is a geopolitical region between at the border of Europe and Asia. It is home to the Caucasus Mountains, including Europe's highest mountain ....
history, Georgian law, paleography, diplomacy, music, drama and other subjects, producing landmark studies in these fields.
Early in 1918, he served instrumental in founding Georgia's first regular university in Tbilisi, thus realizing a long-time dream cherished by generations of Georgian intellectuals but consistently frustrated by the Imperial Russian authorities. The Tbilisi University (present-day
I. Javakhishvili Tbilisi State UniversityTbilisi Ivane Javakhishvili State University, better known as Tbilisi State University , is a university established on 8 February, 1918 in Tbilisi, Georgia. TSU is the oldest university in the whole Caucasus region...
, TSU, which now bears his name), of which Javakhishvili became a professor and the head of the Department of the History of Georgia, rapidly assumed a dominant position in Georgia's educational life. In 1919, Javakhishvili succeeded the noted chemist
Petre MelikishviliPetre Melikishvili Georgian chemist . He was the co-founder of Tbilisi State University and the first Rector of TSU.- Biography :...
as the second rector of the university: he served until June 1926, when, in the aftermath of anti-Soviet August Uprising of 1924, tolerance of non-
MarxistMarxism is the political philosophy and economic worldview based upon a materialist interpretation of history, a Marxist analysis of capitalism, a theory of social change, and an atheist view of human liberation derived from the work of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels; three primary aspects of...
intellectuals began to contract. Although he was permitted to publish and teach, this eclipse probably saved his life, since his successor at the university, was among the victims of the Stalinist
Great PurgeGreat Purge was a series of campaigns of political repression and persecution in the Soviet Union orchestrated by Joseph Stalin in 1937–1938. It involved a large-scale purge of the Communist Party and Government officials, repression of peasants, Red Army leadership, and the persecution of...
of 1936-7. He was forced to leave the TSU in 1938, and appointed a director of the Department of History at the State Museum of Georgia which he headed until his death in Tbilisi in 1940. He was interred at the yard of the TSU.
Legacy and works
Javakhishvili authored more than 170 works dealing with various aspects of Georgia's political, cultural, social and economic history. Since the publication of its first edition back in 1908, his main work,
A History of the Georgian Nation (fully published between 1908 and 1949), has remained one of the most comprehensive and eloquent treatments of pre-modern Georgian history. Regrettably, it has not been translated into any other language. Several of Javakhishvili's most influential articles and books including
A History of the Georgian Nation have been reprinted in his twelve-volume collected works from 1977 and 1998.
Further reading