The Life Story of Greatmartyr Ketevan the Queen of Georgia
The holy
Queen Ketevan was the daughter of Ashotan Mukhran-Batoni, a prominent ruler
from the Bagrationi royal family. The clever and pious Ketevan was married to
Prince David, heir to the throne of Kakheti. David’s father, King Alexander II
(1574-1605), had two other sons, George and Constantine, but according to the
law the throne belonged to David. Constantine was converted to Islam and raised
in the court of the Persian shah Abbas I.
Several
years after David and Ketevan were married, King Alexander stepped down from
the throne and was tonsured a monk at Alaverdi. But after four months, in the
year 1602, the young king David died suddenly. He was survived by his wife,
Ketevan, and two children—a son, Teimuraz, and a daughter, Elene—and his father
ascended the throne once more.
Upon
hearing of David’s death and Alexander’s return to the royal throne, Shah Abbas
commanded Alexander’s youngest son, Constantine-Mirza, to travel to Kakheti,
murder his father and the middle brother, George, and seize the throne of
Kakheti. As instructed, Constantine-Mirza beheaded his father and brother, then
sent their heads, like a precious gift, to Shah Abbas.
Their
headless bodies he sent to Alaverdi. (Since the beginning of the 11th century,
Alaverdi had been the resting place of the Kakhetian kings.) The widowed Queen
Ketevan was left to bury her father-in-law and brother-in-law.
But
Constantine-Mirza was still unsatisfied, and he proposed to take Queen Ketevan
as his wife.
Outraged
at his proposition, the nobles of Kakheti rose up and killed the young man who
had committed patricide and profaned his Faith and the throne. Having buried
the wicked Constantine-Mirza with the honor befitting his royal ancestry,
Ketevan sent generous gifts to Shah Abbas and requested that he proclaim her
son, Teimuraz, the rightful heir to the throne.
While she
was awaiting his reply, Ketevan assumed personal responsibility for the rule of
Kakheti. Concerned that, if he denied this request, Kakheti would forcibly
separate from him and unite with Kartli, Shah Abbas hastily sent Prince
Teimuraz to Georgia, laden with great wealth.
In 1614
Shah Abbas informed King Teimuraz that his son would be taken hostage, and
Teimuraz was forced to send his young son Alexander and his mother Ketevan to
Persia. As a final attempt to divide the royal family of Kakheti, Shah Abbas
demanded that the eldest prince, Levan, be brought before him, and he finally
summoned King Teimuraz himself.
The
shah’s intentions were clear: to hold all of the royal family in Persia and
send his own viceroys to rule in Kakheti. He sought to eliminate King Luarsab
II of Kartli as well, but Teimuraz and Luarsab agreed to attack the Persian
army with joint forces and drive the enemy out of Georgia.
Shah
Abbas sent his hostages, Queen Ketevan and her grandsons, deep into Persia,
while he himself launched an attack on Kakheti.
With fire
and the sword the godless ruler plundered all of Georgia. The royal palace was
razed, churches and monasteries were destroyed, and entire villages were
abandoned. By order of the shah, more than three hundred thousand Georgians
were exiled to Persia, and their homes were occupied by Turkic tribes from
Central Asia. Hunger and violence reigned over Georgia.
The
defeated Georgian kings Teimuraz and Luarsab sought refuge with King George III
of Imereti.
After
they had spent five years exiled in Shiraz (Persia), the princes Alexander and
Levan were separated from Ketevan and castrated in Isfahan. Alexander could not
endure the suffering and died, while Levan went mad.
Saint
Ketevan, meanwhile, remained a prisoner of the ruler of southeastern Persia,
the ethnic Georgian imam Quli-Khan Undiladze, who regarded the widowed Queen of
Kakheti with great respect. According to his command, Ketevan was not to
discover the fate of her grandsons.
Queen
Ketevan spent ten years in prison, praying for her motherland and loved ones
with all her might and adhering to a strict ascetic regime. Constant fasting,
prayer and a stone bed exhausted her previously pampered body, but in spirit
she was courageous and full of vitality. She looked after those assigned to her
care and instructed them in the spiritual life.
After
some time Abbas resolved to convert Ketevan to Islam, and he announced his
intention to marry her. He asked that his proposal be conveyed to her the same
day she was informed of the fate of her grandsons. As a condition of their
marriage, Abbas insisted that Ketevan renounce the Christian Faith and convert
to Islam. In the case of her acquiescence, Imam Quli-Khan was to respect and
honor her as a queen, and in the case of her refusal, to subject her to public
torture.
The
alarmed imam begged the queen to submit to the shah’s will and save herself,
but the queen firmly refused and began to prepare for her martyrdom. (According
to one foreign observer, her steadfastness delayed the Islamization of the
Georgians in Persia: “In the course of a conversation at the court of Shah
Abbas, where a young and recently converted Georgian was present, the question
arose as to why it was that, while all young Georgians were forced to embrace
Islam, their mothers were not. The explanation given by one of those present
was that since the Queen would not change her faith Georgian mothers likewise
refused.” (Z. Avalishvili, “Teimuraz I and His Poem ‘The Martyrdom of Queen
Ketevan,’” Georgica [vol I, no. 4/5, 1937] pp. 22.)
Queen
Ketevan was robed in festive attire and led out to a crowded square. Her
persecutors subjected her to indescribable torment: they placed a red-hot
copper cauldron on her head, tore at her chest with heated tongs, pierced her
body with glowing spears, tore off her fingernails, nailed a board to her
spine, and finally split her forehead with a red-hot spade.
Saint
Ketevan’s soul departed from her body, and the executioners cast her mutilated
body to the beasts. But the Lord God sent a miracle: her holy relics were
illumined with a radiant light.
A group
of French Augustinian missionary fathers, who had witnessed the inhuman
tortures, wrapped Queen Ketevan’s body in linens scented with myrrh and incense
and buried it in a Catholic monastery.
Some time
later the holy relics of Great-martyr Ketevan were delivered to her son,
Teimuraz, King of Kakheti.
Teimuraz
wept bitterly for his mother and sons and buried the relics with great honor in
the Alaverdi Cathedral of Saint George.
Source: https://oca.org/saints/lives/2016/09/13/102608-greatmartyr-ketevan-the-queen-of-georgia