Alaverdoba

It focuses on Alaverdi Cathedral from which it derives its name, with the suffix –oba designating attribution.

Historically Alaverdoba lasted for three weeks in a three-step cycle, reflecting pre-Christian cults related to the Moon.

In the 19th century, a tradition of agricultural fair was added to the festival.

It has been a subject of several contemporary ethnological accounts and travelogues[1] as well as the focus of Giorgi Shengelaya’s 1962 semi-documentary Alaverdoba.

[2] Alaverdoba survived the Soviet era and is still widely celebrated in Kakheti, attended by locals as well as visitors from the neighboring communities such as the Kists from the Pankisi Gorge.