Gostibe, Murals of the Church of Holy Trinity

Building:	Gostibe, Сhurch of Holy Trinity
Layer of the Murals:	One Layer
Date/Period:	10th-11th cc.
Donor(s):	Unknown
Painter(s):	Unknown

Inscription(s)

of the Donor(s)

of the Painter(s)

Description

Later, following the construction, the interior of the church was plastered completely. By now, a considerable part of the plaster has come off which resulted in exposure of images of crosses produced directly on the unplastered wall. Apparently, while building the church, it was images of relief and red-painted crosses that served as artistic décor of the facades and the interior. Part of the relief crosses on the facades were probably painted red.

Aisle

Presently, the painted images of the cross have survived on the south and west walls of the interior, although in the 1970s a cross could be discerned on the north wall as well. It had been represented symmetrically with and opposite the one depicted on the south (probably, above the door).

A big size (height – 60 cm) equal-armed cross with flared ends is depicted at 130 cm above the floor level in the eastern section of the south wall. The stroke of red paint partly extends over the plaster existing around the masonry stone. The place for the cross had specially been chosen – it is placed not in the center, but in the eastern section, so that someone entering the interior through the door cut in the north wall could see it in front.

A similar image was depicted in the center of the west wall at the same height of 130 cm.

Bibliography

Rusudan Mepisashvili, “Pamjatniki arkhitektury X–XI vekov v sel. Kaberi i Gostibe” [“10th-11th-Century Architectural Monuments in the villages of Kaberi and Gostibe”], Ars Georgica 8–A (1979): 57, sch. 35/3.

Katsia Giorgobiani, Guram Ch’eishvili, “Ts.’ samebis eklesia” [“Church of the Holy Trinity”], in sak’art’velos istoriisa da kulturis dzeglt’a aghts’eriloba [The Survey of the Historical and Cultural Monuments of Georgia] 5 (Tbilisi, 1990), 151.