ABSTRACT
The Life of the Kings comes to an abrupt close with the arrival of the holy woman Nino, whose labours secured the conversion of Queen Nana and then of her husband Mirian. It is highly unlikely that the original version of this ca. 800 text ended sharply within Mirian’s reign, on the eve of his acceptance of the Christian God. Nonetheless, ever since Leonti Mroveli assembled C‛xorebay k‛art‛velt‛a mep‛et‛a in the eleventh century, Mirian’s Christian phase has been exclusively narrated in K‛art‛lis c‛xovreba by The Life of Nino, a vita of the ninth/tenth century.1 The first incarnation of The Life of the Kings – or, at the very least, its source – must have incorporated an independent historiographical account of Mirian’s Christianisation. This elaboration of the Christian Mirian would have had rather different interests and aims than the hagiographical vision of the subsequent Life of Nino. If the overall tone of the received Life of the Kings is any indication, its lost treatment of the Christian Mirian would have shone the spotlight more fully on the king than on the holy woman. And it would have openly celebrated the Iranic dimensions of Mirian’s authority and royal image, not unlike Trdat’s representation in Agat‛angełos. As presented in K‛art‛lis c‛xovreba, The Life of Nino picks up the tale as Mirian turned his back on polytheism – which is intertwined with Nino’s backstory – and concludes with Mirian’s death and burial at Mc‛xet‛a’s Upper Church, site of the later Samt‛avro.
