ABSTRACT
The chapter discusses the varied usages of the medieval Georgian concept of “the Lot of the Mother of God” in contemporary political discourses. The belief in medieval writing that Georgia had been allotted to the Mother of God for conversion was one of the most powerful tropes of the sacralization of Georgia, the Georgian language, and the reigning dynasty. Since the nineteenth century, this narrative was eagerly appropriated by the Russian religious and political discourse and incorporated into the rhetoric of empire. Consequently, today, Georgia’s sacralization through the concept of the “Lot” has been severely criticized as a dangerous residue of Russian imperial subjectivity. The debates over Georgia’s foreign and domestic policies and its Euro-Atlantic or Eurasian aspirations have been largely unfolding with this medieval concept in the picture.
