Poetry · A way to begin
The Knight in the Panther's Skin
ვეფხისტყაოსანი
Shota Rustaveli · 1200
Synopsis
Rostevan, king of Arabia, has no son and has his daughter, the beautiful and wise Tinatin, crowned. During a hunt, the king and his general Avtandil catch sight of a knight dressed in an animal skin who weeps by a river, kills those sent toward him and disappears. Tinatin asks Avtandil to find him within three years, promising him her hand. He finally discovers him in a cave: he is Tariel, an Indian prince mourning Nestan-Darejan, his lost beloved, and Avtandil swears to help him find her.
Context
The poem runs to more than sixteen hundred quatrains and sets its plot in an imaginary India and Arabia, an allegory of the reign of Tamar, of whom Nestan-Darejan is said to be the figure. The oldest surviving complete manuscript dates from 1646. King Vakhtang VI had it printed in Tbilisi in 1712, in the country's first printing house, with a learned commentary that founded Rustavelian studies. It has been translated into French by Serge Tsouladzé under the title Le Chevalier à la peau de tigre, and by Gaston Bouatchidzé, whose version puts a panther in place of the tiger.
Who it is for
A long poem in monorhyme quatrains, to be read canto by canto; the tales are nested one within another, and the friendship between the heroes counts as much as the love.
Prizes and reception
A masterpiece of medieval Georgian letters, translated into more than fifty languages; until the beginning of the twentieth century, it was part of the dowry of brides.