ABSTRACT
The establishment of a vast monastic unit in the Gareja desert (southeastern Georgia) by St. David, one of the so-called Thirteen Syrian Fathers who had come to Georgia in the mid sixth century, greatly altered the character of monasticism in the Christian Caucasus. 1 From the very beginning the graves of the founders of the monasteries, local saints, and martyrs, had been major sites of worship and pilgrimage, and the most popular of these sites in the Gareja rock-cut monasteries continuously increased over the centuries. Among them the number of martyria was great. This is not surprising, because the expansive monastic union was situated in the most significant confessional, political and commercial crossroads, and thus Gareja permanently suffered from invaders. And this, in its turn, increased the number of martyred monks either by individuals or whole groups.
