Shemokmedi ( ka, შემოქმედი) is a village in the

Ozurgeti Municipality Ozurgeti ( ka, ოზურგეთის მუნიციპალიტეტი, ''Ozurgetis munitsipalit'et'i'') is a municipality of Georgia (country), Georgia, in the region of Guria. Its main town is Ozurgeti. Ozurgeti municipality is l ...

Guria Guria ( ka, გურია) is a region (''mkhare'') in Georgia (country), Georgia, in the western part of the country, bordered by the eastern end of the Black Sea. The region has a population of 104,338 (2023), with Ozurgeti as the regional cap ...

Georgia Georgia most commonly refers to: * Georgia (country), a country in the South Caucasus * Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the southeastern United States Georgia may also refer to: People and fictional characters * Georgia (name), a list of pe ...

. It is located in western Georgia, on the Bzhuzhi river, at elevation of 190 m above sea level, 7 km east of the city of

Ozurgeti Ozurgeti ( ka, ოზურგეთი ) is the capital of the western Georgia (country), Georgian province of Guria. It was formerly known as Macharadze or Makharadze (named in honor of Filipp Makharadze). It is a regional center of tea and haze ...

. The village is home to the late medieval

Shemokmedi Monastery The Shemokmedi monastery ( ka, შემოქმედის მონასტერი) is a Georgian Orthodox monastery located at the village of Shemokmedi in Georgia (country), Georgia's southwestern region of Guria. Founded in the 15th cent ...

History

Archaeological reconnaissance works conducted at Shemokmedi from 1991 to 1994 yielded fragments of pottery characteristic of the

Kura–Araxes culture The Kura–Araxes culture (also named ''Kur–Araz culture, Mtkvari–Araxes culture, Early Transcaucasian culture, Shengavitian culture'') was an archaeological culture that existed from about 4000 BC until about 2000 BC, which has traditionally ...

, suggesting that the area had already been inhabited in the

Early Bronze Age The Bronze Age () was a historical period characterised principally by the use of bronze tools and the development of complex urban societies, as well as the adoption of writing in some areas. The Bronze Age is the middle principal period of ...

. The recorded history of Shemokmedi is inextricably bound to the monastery complex which sits on a small hill overlooking the village. The monastery was founded by the

Gurieli The House of Gurieli () was a Georgia (country), Georgian princely (''mtavari'') family and a ruling dynasty (dukes) of the southwestern Georgian province of Guria, which was autonomous and later, for a few centuries, independent. A few ducal ru ...

family, rulers of the

Principality of Guria The Principality of Guria ( ka, გურიის სამთავრო, tr) was a historical state in Georgia. Centered on modern-day Guria, a southwestern region in Georgia, it was located between the Black Sea and Lesser Caucasus, and was ...

, in the 15th century as a seat of a

Georgian Orthodox The Apostolic Autocephalous Orthodox Church of Georgia ( ka, საქართველოს სამოციქულო ავტოკეფალური მართლმადიდებელი ეკლესია, tr), commonl ...

bishop A bishop is an ordained member of the clergy who is entrusted with a position of Episcopal polity, authority and oversight in a religious institution. In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance and administration of di ...

. Furthermore, it was a safe-house of church treasures and, by the late 19th century, had accumulated an extensive collection of various objects from other Georgian monasteries. At that time, the locale was fortified, housing a castle owned by the Gurieli. During the 1819–1820 uprising in

Imereti Imereti ( Georgian: იმერეთი, ) is a region of Georgia situated in the central-western part of the republic along the middle and upper reaches of the Rioni River. Imereti is the most populous region in Georgia. It consists of 11 mun ...

and Guria against the

Imperial Russian The Russian Empire was an empire that spanned most of northern Eurasia from its establishment in November 1721 until the proclamation of the Russian Republic in September 1917. At its height in the late 19th century, it covered about , roughl ...

rule, the Shemokmedi castle, then in possession of Prince Kaikhosro Gurieli, was the principal rebel stronghold in Guria. It was there that, in April 1820, the Gurians put the captured Russian interim governor of Imereti, Colonel Puzyrevsky, to death and dashed an attempt by the Russian punitive force to attack the castle. On 24 July 1820, the Russian general Aleksey Velyaminov stormed and captured Shemokmedi. The castle, dubbed by the Russian officials "an abode of brigandage", was razed to the ground in an act of revenge; houses were all burned down and farmlands and vineyards were destroyed to punish the locals with "extreme poverty".

Population

As of the 2014 national census, Shemokmedi had a population of 1,322. Most of them (99.5%) are ethnic

Georgians Georgians, or Kartvelians (; ka, ქართველები, tr, ), are a nation and Peoples of the Caucasus, Caucasian ethnic group native to present-day Georgia (country), Georgia and surrounding areas historically associated with the Ge ...

People from Shemokmedi

* Ivan Dumbadze (1851–1916), an Imperial Russian general and official. *

Vladimir Nemirovich-Danchenko Vladimir Ivanovich Nemirovich-Danchenko (; – 25 April 1943) was a Soviet and Russian theatre director, writer, pedagogue Pedagogy (), most commonly understood as the approach to teaching, is the theory and practice of learning, and how t ...

(1858–1943), a Russian theatre director and writer. *

Filipp Makharadze Filipp Yeseyevich Makharadze ( ka, ფილიპე მახარაძე, ; 9 March 1868 – 10 December 1941) was a Georgian Bolshevik revolutionary and government official. Life Born in the village of Shemokmedi (Guria, Georgia), Makha ...

(1868–1941), a Georgian Bolshevik politician. * Varlam Simonishvili (1888–1950), a Georgian folk singer. * Rezo Esadze (born 1934), a Georgian film director and actor.

Notes

References

* * * {{cite book, last=Rayfield, first=Donald, author-link=Donald Rayfield, title=Edge of Empires: A History of Georgia, year=2012, publisher=Reaktion Books, location=London, isbn=978-1780230306 Populated places in Ozurgeti Municipality