Gorjī – Marker of Georgian Identity in Iran

The contemporary society is widely informed about population of Georgian roots residing outside of Georgia, namely in the Islamic Republic of Iran. This population is called as Georgians of Iran. For a long period, this ethnonym used to unite Georgians of Fereydan, Georgian nationals who four centuries ago were captured and resettled to Fereydan, the central province of Iran.Even the contemporary days have preserved a strong trace of Georgian material and spiritual culture in this Region – they speak Georgian, there are Georgian villages and Georgian surnames.Both Georgian and foreign sources prove that Georgian captives were settled in other provinces too, besides the central region of Iran, namely: western districts of Iran, southern coastline of the Caspian Sea, Khorasan and others. However, the interest in descendents of resettled Georgians was mainly related to Fereydan and less attention was paid to the Georgian culture heritage beyond this territory in IranIn case of Fereydan, geographic environment and conditions have preconditioned survival of the Georgian community and the Georgian culture in it. However, contemporary research works have showed that there are regions in Iran, besides Fereydan, where descendents of Georgians live even today and they partly have maintained their national identity – not in religion or language, but in ethnonyms, toponyms and in certain mythologized historical memory.In the 21st century, the term of Georgians of Iran unites one additional ethnonym – Georgians of Mazandaran. The northern province of Iran, Mazandaran is located on the southern coastline of the Caspian Sea, to the east of Gilan.

Keywords:

Gorjī , Mazandaran , Georgians of Mazandaran