The Martyred Knights of Georgian Shakespeariana

Summary

The art of translation was known in Georgia from early times. Translations of the Bible appeared as far back as the fourth century. Practically all major Byzantine writings had been rendered into Georgian as early as the tenth and thirteenth centuries, the same being true of Eastern literature and lore. Incidentally, The Wisdom of Balavar or Barlaam and Josaphat legend was also translated by unknown translators into Georgian, and there is a remote and intriguing link between this translation and Shakespeare, however mysterious it may seem. The parable of the caskets could hardly have found its way into The Merchant of Venice unless the first Christian version of the legend had been available – I quote from the Encyclopaedia Britannica – “... from the Arabic by the Georgians ... The Greek recension ... which is a highly embroidered rendering of the Georgian, was made on Mt Athos by St Euthymius (d. 1028) the Iberian (that is Georgian), possibly in collaboration with Greek monks there ... From the Greek came the Latin, Slavonic, Christian Arabic and other Christian versions.”

Shakespeare himself was hardly aware of Georgia, a small country in the Caucasus of which the West learnt later. And yet it is The Merchant of Venice in which we find these lines:

. . . and her sunny locks

Hang on her temples like a golden fleece,

Which makes her seat of Belmont Colchis' strand,

And many Jasons come in quest of her.

(1.1.169-72)