Historical Documents
The national centre of manuscripts stores over 30 000 Georgian manuscripts (9th-19th centuries) and several thousand foreign historical documents, including Persian and Turkish documents, decrees and reports of Shahs etc.
Relationship between Iran and Georgia has been culturally diverse and long-lasting. The geopolitical location of our country provided a solid historical and cultural connection with Eastern neighbor. In 16th-18th centuries, Georgia’s political leaders (kings) views were vastly influenced by Iranian politics. This fact is proven by numerous Persian, Georgian and Georgian-Persian documents and narrative sources.
The documents preserved in the centre concern political, economical and social topics of Azerbaijan, Armenia, Dagestan, also Russia-Iran confrontation in the Caucasus region and so on (19th Century Persian document, which is rich with ornaments and is a great representation of book illumination tradition).
Studying the Persian historical documents has a long history; unfortunately, these data could not have been reached by the masses. However, nowadays, having established the English database of Georgian-Iranian relationship, it gives the Centre an opportunity to enroll these documents in scientific researches, which is important not only for South Caucasus, but for Christian and Muslim cultures as well.
Georgian Document Fund
The fund of Georgian documents stores over 30, 000 documents, which date from 9th to 19th centuries. the content of documents vary from secular to ecclesiastical and the most significant pieces are the original documents (12-13 centuries) of Georgian King’s and Queen’s, high-ranking officials, Catholicos’ and bishop’s documents with their signatures. The fund of Georgian documents is divided into four sub-funds: Ad, Sd, Hd and Qd.
Arabic Document Fund
The Arabic document fund holds over 300 Dagestan documents (original and copies), which were purchased in 1930s.The documents are of older descent and date from 17th to 19th centuries.
The document depicts the 18th-19th century history of Dagestan and the local mountaineer traditions. One of the most significant pieces is a group of documents (Arld 22-85), which describes important notes about the movement led by Imam Shamil. The collection also stores several meaningful documents about Georgia-Dagestan relationship (Arld 10, 11, 16, 18, 21).
Ottoman Document Fund
The collection stores diverse, around 300 documents of Ottoman descent (mainly, originals) and date from 16th to 19th centuries.
The collection includes the deeds (Berats, Firmans and Hukmas) given to Georgian nobles by Ottoman Sultans.
The oldest document in the collection is a card, written in 1586, that concerns the lands of Jaqeli. The National Centre of Manuscripts is the best place for researching not only the Turkish-Georgian political, economical and cultural relationship, but Ottoman politics, military system and other subjects as well.
Armenian Document Fund (Armd)
The collection stores around 200 Armenian historical documents (several Georgian-Armenian documents).
The majority of documents date from 18th to 19th centuries; the fund contains reports, deeds of purchase and debts, the official correspondence of Armenian clergyman and other interesting material for 18-19th Century Caucasia.
Persian Document Fund (Pd)
The collection holds up to 500 documents, including: decrees, reports, deeds of purchase, petitions of Persian Shahs, Georgian Kings and other civil servant resolutions. The documents date from 16th to 19th centuries, when the influence of Persian was in its zenith.
The most notable works of the collection includes Georgian-Persian bilingual documents, which contain crucial information about Georgian-Persian relationship, their political, as well as economical history and reports of 16th-19th Century Armenia, Azerbaijan and Dagestan.