The Conversion of Georgia

The oldest of the accounts cited here was written in Latin by Rufinus about 402. About the time of the mission of Frumentius (see the conversion of Aksum), he says, the Iberians, a people living towards the Black Sea, received the faith through a captive woman. She prayed day and night, and when they asked why, she said that this was how she worshipped Christ as God. A mother brought her a sick child; she laid it on her hair-cloth, prayed, and gave it back healed (Rufinus, Church History 10.11 (book 1, chapter 10 in Migne), col. 480). The queen, who was gravely ill, had herself carried to the woman’s cell and was healed in the same way (Rufinus, Church History 10.11 (book 1, chapter 10 in Migne), col. 480) (Rufinus, Church History 10.11 (book 1, chapter 10 in Migne), cols. 481–482).

The king, Rufinus continues, put off his wife’s urging until one day, hunting in the forest, he was caught in a darkness so thick that he lost his companions. He vowed in his mind to worship the Christ of whom the captive had spoken, and no other, if he were freed, and the daylight returned at once. Though not yet initiated himself, he preached to his people. When a church was begun, no machine could raise its third column; the captive prayed there all night, and in the morning the king found it hanging a foot above its base, onto which it settled while all looked on. On her advice an embassy went to the emperor Constantine to ask for priests, and he sent them. Rufinus says that he heard all this at Jerusalem from Bacurius, whom he calls king of that people and who was then commanding the frontier troops of Palestine (Rufinus, Church History 10.11 (book 1, chapter 10 in Migne), cols. 481–482). He names neither the woman, the king, the queen nor their city (Rufinus, Church History 10.11 (book 1, chapter 10 in Migne), col. 480) (Rufinus, Church History 10.11 (book 1, chapter 10 in Migne), cols. 481–482). Socrates repeats the account, citing Rufinus by name, and says that the embassy also asked for an alliance with the Romans (Socrates, Church History 1.20). Sozomen and Theodoret tell it in much the same form, also without the names (Sozomen, Church History 2.7) (Theodoret, Church History 1.23).

The names come from Georgian texts. Their translators, Marjory and J. O. Wardrop, dated the oldest manuscript they used to the ninth or tenth century (Life of Nino translators’ preface, p. 3). A short chronicle, The Conversion of Kartli, says that a captive woman called Nino fled with Hripsime and Gayane into the Armenia of King Trdat, where they were martyred (their story is told under the conversion of Armenia), and that Nino escaped northward over the mountains (Conversion of Kartli Wardrop, pp. 61–62). She came to Mtskheta, “a great city, the royal residence”, and prayed there for three years in a bramble thicket outside the walls, before a cross of vine stems. In her sixth year she brought the king’s wife, Nana, to believe, and in the seventh the king was converted “by a miracle”. He built a church in the royal garden and sent to Constantine for priests, and when Bishop Ioane came with two priests and a deacon, King Mirean, the queen and their household were baptised (Conversion of Kartli Wardrop, p. 62).

The longer Life of Nino presents itself as her own story, told at her death to Salome of Ujarma, King Mirian’s daughter-in-law (Life of Nino p. 7). It has the episodes that Rufinus tells, with names and places: the healing of Queen Nana, whom Nino touches with her cross (Life of Nino p. 32); the darkness that falls on King Mirian while he hunts on Mount Tkhoti, and his vow to the God of Nino (Life of Nino pp. 36–37); and the great cedar pillar that no one could raise until, towards dawn, a youth clothed in light set it upright (Life of Nino pp. 38–40). In the Life too Constantine sends the bishop Ioane (Life of Nino p. 42), and Nino is buried at the village of Budi in Kakheti, which the translators’ heading calls Bodbe (Life of Nino p. 56). It calls her an apostle and the “enlightener of all Georgia” and gives 14 January as her feast (Life of Nino p. 7).