The first Georgian book printed in moveable type

[Irbachi, Niceforo (ed.)]. Alphabetum Ibericum, sive Georgianum, cum oratione dominicali, salutatione angelica, symbolo fidei, praecepta decalogi, ecclesiae sacramentis, et operibus misericordiae.

€ 6,000.00

The Georgian language enters the world of print with this tiny volume of prayers in Mkhedruli script, a rare and early monument of the recently established printing office of the Catholic Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith. Predating the first printing press in Georgia itself by eighty years, it is the earliest moveable-type book printed in Georgian.

In the 1620s, the Catholic Church began training priests in the Georgian language, hoping to win converts in the traditionally Orthodox country, which had become increasingly isolated, divided and beleaguered following the fall of Constantinople in 1453. Stefano Paolini, the first director of the Propaganda Fide's printing office, produced a Georgian-Italian dictionary with the aid of the Georgian Orthodox priest and diplomat, Nikoloz Cholokashvili (also known as Nikephorus Irbachi). Just prior, this small volume appeared, containing the rudiments of the Catholic faith in Georgian; Amaduzzi credits it to Irbachi alone. The volume begins with an exposition of the Georgian alphabet, showing the forms, names and values of the letters, both individually and in ligatures, drawing comparisons to the sounds of Arabic, Hebrew, Spanish and Italian. There follow a series of prayers, both in Georgian, and in Latin written in Georgian characters.

Home to one of the most ancient Christian communities in the world, Georgia officially embraced Christianity in 319, only five years after Constantine's proclamation of tolerance for the faith in the Roman Empire. In spite of this venerable tradition, a series of foreign wars with the Ottoman, Persian and Russian Empires in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries led many Georgians to look to Europe and to the Roman Catholic Church for assistance. Nonetheless, Georgian Orthodoxy has remained the dominant creed.

An early monument to the Georgian language and to the printing endeavours of the Propaganda Fide. Rare Book Hub records only four complete and freestanding copies of this work sold since 1980.