Kldeeti

Kldeeti

 

a village in Zestafoni Raion, Georgian SSR (near the ancient city of Shorapani), where in 1942 a family necropolis of important military leaders of the second century A.D. was excavated. The artifacts discovered included local gold polychrome ornaments with granulation, intaglios and cameos, silver and bronze (for the most part imported) vessels, glass, pottery, bronze animal figurines, small bells and other magical objects, and bronze and iron weapons. It has been dated on the basis of silver Roman and Parthian coins of the first and second centuries A.D. and local gold coins. The necropolis has much in common with the finds from the necropolises of the ancient Georgian nobility in Mtskheta, Bori, Zguderi, and other sites, as well as from a burial in Loo, near Sochi. The remains of Kldeeti characterize the culture of Georgia (Iberia and Colchis) of the late classical period and its ties with the classical world.

REFERENCES

Lomtatidze, G. A. Nekropol’ II v. n. e. v Kldeeti. Tbilisi, 1957. (In Georgian, with Russian summary.)
Kapanadze, D. G. “Izobrazhenie znakov vlasti na drevnegruzinskikh monetakh.” In the collection Kratkie soobshcheniia o dokladakh i polevykh issledovaniiakh Instituta istorii material’noi kul’tury AN SSSR, [issue] 66. Moscow, 1956.

G. A. LOMTATIDZE