Research Issues on the Upper Garment of the Clergy (chokha)

Abstract

In the history of human culture, making and using clothes is an ancient and important achievement. It has played the role of a social sign since the beginning. Representatives of the high and low circles of society, clergymen, and warriors dressed in different ways.

The main types of clothing were historically created according to economic, religious, social and ethnic characteristics. We are focused on the Georgian Orthodox Church clergy clothing, which they wore in the past and in what form it has reached till today, what were the structural features of the clothing elements, what materials were used to produce and shape it.

Clothing of the Orthodox Church clerics from the different countries has common features, which have been developed on the basis of a long, close spiritual and cultural-historical relationship. According to Archipieraticon, such elements of the shared fund are: stikar, philon, gingila, olar, anchor, omphor, bison, knee pad etc. However, this does not exclude the existence of self-contained elements in the clothing of the clergy of the Georgian Orthodox Church.

According to Georgian written sources, we find the following terms for the parts of clergy clothing: Olar, Quarti, Sabechuri, Chokha, Samkhari, Kunkul, Schema, Mister's garment, Quart-filon, Omfori, Palekarti and others.

Most of the terms still refer to parts of nowadays clerical clothing, but some have either changed meaning or have completely disappeared over time. From the listed terms, chokha and kunkula are parts of a nun's garment and the rest are parts of a priest's clothing.

Due to some reasons, from the 19th century, the most important and ancient element chokha was lost from the set of clothes, which led to our interest in the mentioned issue.

The term chokha can be found in Georgian written sources since the 9th century. From the materials we have researched, it became clear that from the pre-feudal age, in particular, from the 9th to the 18th century, it was a term denoting the upper garment and wool used for chokha of the clergy of both sexes. Later, this term is also used to denote the clothing of the secular public.

On the basis of the conducted research, we reconstructed the sketch of the upper garment of the clergy and developed its construction.