Christianity
ვარძია
Vardzia
“A city of rock, cut thirteen storeys into the face of a cliff”
Photo: Bernard Gagnon · CC BY 4.0
Scenes
Meaning
From across the valley one face of the cliff is honeycombed with openings, and stepping inside, rooms and stairways and chapels hewn from the rock run on tier above tier.
Tradition holds that this cave monastery city was cut into the tuff cliffs of Mount Erusheti in the twelfth century under George III and his daughter Queen Tamar. At its height thirteen storeys held more than six hundred rooms, chapels, refectories and water cisterns for thousands of people, serving as both monastery and fortress against invasion from the south. An earthquake in 1283 sheared away the outer face and laid the interior open, and in the Church of the Dormition a twelfth-century fresco preserves the likeness of Queen Tamar. A small community of monks keeps prayer here still.
Field notes
- Location
- Vardzia · Georgia · N41.4° · E43.3°
- Best time
- Clear mornings of spring and early autumn, when light falls full on the cliff
- Getting there
- Three to four hours by road from Tbilisi, entering the valley by way of Akhaltsikhe.
- Etiquette
- Quiet is kept in the church where services continue, and the frescoes are never touched.
Sources
- · Encyclopaedia Britannica
- · Georgian National Tourism Administration
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