ABOUT THE BOOK BY A. MARSOV “SHORT GEORGIAN HISTORY”
Abstract
In the first half of the XIX century, Russian historiography devoted much attention to the topic of the Caucasus. This was due to the historical events that took place in the region since the beginning of this century. Russia was gradually conquering the Caucasus, and its actions had to be unconditionally supported by both historical works and materials published in the press, which aroused great interest in the Russian public.
The article encompasses and examines the book of the Russian poet, historian and state councilor Alexei Vasilyevich Marsov „Short Georgian History”, which was published in 1840 in Moscow, in the printing house of the Lazarev Institute of Oriental Languages. Since 1836, while teaching lessons from Georgian history at the Tiflis Theological Seminary, he made a short outline of them. Information provided by the author in his publication is very brief.
In this article, we will try to answer the questions - what is the assessment of the past events in Georgia in the book of A. Marsov? Is this myth-making and are we dealing with the fruits of the author's own imagination, or is there an objective description of the facts in the work?
- Marsov introduced Georgia to the Russian-speaking readers, but in many cases to distorted facts. In using such material, the researcher must be critical to avoid falsifying history that took place centuries ago.
Keywords: A. Marsov, Georgia, Russia, written sources, historical literature, XIX century
