Memory
Vakhtang entered a pantheon of Georgian historical heroes already in the Middle Ages. A royal oriflamme of the Georgian Bagratids was known as "Gorgasliani", i.e., "of Gorgasali". It is sometimes supposed to be the earliest model of the current Georgian national flag. In popular memory, his image has acquired a legendary and romantic façade. Vakhtang is a subject of several folk poems and legends, extolling the king’s perceived greatness, enormous physical strength, courage and devoutness to Christianity.
Vakhtang has been credited with foundation of several towns, castles, and monasteries across Georgia, including the nation’s capital Tbilisi, where a street and a square bear his name, and a 1967 monument by the sculptor Elguja Amashukeli tops the Metekhi cliff. A legend has it that when King Vakhtang was in the forest, his falcon chased a pheasant. The bird fell into a hot water spring and the king and his servants saw the steam come out of the water. Surprised by the abundance of hot water, Vakhtang gave orders to build a city on this site and named it "Tbilisi", that is, "the site of warm springs".
Vakhtang was officially included in the Georgian Orthodox calendar – and a church built in his honor in the city of Rustavi – early in the 1990s, but he had presumably been considered a saint long before that. The Georgian church commemorates him as the Holy and Right-believing King Vakhtang on November 30 (O.S.: December 13).
The Vakhtang Gorgasal Order, created in 1992, is one of the highest military decorations in Georgia.
Read more about this topic: Vakhtang I Of Iberia
Famous quotes containing the word memory:
“The secret of success in society, is a certain heartiness and sympathy. A man who is not happy in the company, cannot find any word in his memory that will fit the occasion. All his information is a little impertinent. A man who is happy there, finds in every turn of the conversation equally lucky occasions for the introduction of that which he has to say.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Vashtar: So it’s finished. A structure to house one man and the greatest treasure of all time.
Senta: And a structure that will last for all time.
Vashtar: Only history will tell that.
Senta: Sire, will he not be remembered?
Vashtar: Yes, he’ll be remembered. The pyramid’ll keep his memory alive. In that he built better than he knew.”
—William Faulkner (1897–1962)
“Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased,
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And with some sweet oblivious antidote
Cleanse the fraught bosom of that perilous stuff
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—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)