| Physical description |
xvii, 359 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm |
| Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references (pages 315-348) and index. |
| Contents |
1. Imagining Georgia in Antiquity -- 2. The Geography and Economy of Ancient Georgia -- 3. Archaic Georgia: The Arrival of Greeks in Colchis -- Excursus: The Early Coinage of Colchis -- 4. Achaemenids and Seleucids in Georgia -- 5. Mithridates, Pompey, and the Emergence of Iberia -- 6. Colchis under the Principate -- 7. Iberia under the Principate -- 8. Between Romans and Sassanians: The Third and Fourth Centuries -- 9. War in Lazica: The Fifth and Sixth Centuries. |
| Summary |
This is the first full history of ancient Georgia ever to be written outside Georgia itself. It is also an introduction to the substantial archaeological work that has been carried out in Georgia in recent decades. The principal purpose of the book is to open up ancient Georgia for the world of scholarship at large. It is not only the history of a neglected region, but also a sustained attempt to inform topics and issues that are more familiar to historians of antiquity: the myths of the periphery, particularly of Medea and the Golden Fleece; the Caucasus mountains and their passes; Greek colonization; the Persian, Athenian, and Seleucid empires; Pompey's conquest of Mithridates' empire; the development of the Roman frontier in the eastern Black Sea region; Roman diplomacy in Iberia; the Christianization of Iberia; and Sassanian ambitions in Transcaucasia and Byzantine warfare there. |
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The author has lived in Georgia for substantial periods during the last decade: he has made extensive use of scholarship in Georgian and Russian, and has first-hand knowledge of most of the sites which he discusses. |
| Subject |
Georgia (Republic) -- History -- To 330.
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Colchis -- History.
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Georgia (Republic) -- Antiquities.
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| ISBN |
0198144733 (alkaline paper) |
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