Pshavi

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Pshavi is a small historic region of northern Georgia, nowadays part of the Mtskheta-Mtianeti, and lying chiefly among the southern foothills of the Greater Caucasus mountains along the Pshavis Aragvi River and the upper reaches of the Iori River in the neighbouring region of Tianeti to the south-east. Pshavi borders upon Khevsureti to the north; the western fringe of Tusheti and the northernmost tip of the Pankisi Gorge to the east; the Iori Valley and Tianeti to the south-east; the Jinvali Reservoir and the Georgian Military Road to the south and south-west; and south-eastern Mtiuleti and Gudamakari to the west.

Like many other regions of the world, particularly mountainous ones, the population of Pshavi has dropped significantly as a result of a process of rural exodus which began in the nineteenth century; many former villages nowadays consist of no more than a few houses. An early twentieth-century census of Pshavi counted 210 households in Pshavi "proper" and 368 in Lower Pshavi. The Pshavs speak a dialect of Georgian close to that spoken by their neighbours, the Khevsurs. Nominally Georgian Orthodox, the Pshavs have, however, like other mountain tribes preserved some of their pre-Christian beliefs, which a handful of people continue to profess at the region's numerous shrines. Their history, traditions and customs are also similar to those of their eastern Georgian neighbours. The popular Georgian poet Luka Razikashvili (1861-1915), best known by his pen name "Vaja-Pshavela" ("a lad from Pshavi"), was born in the village of Chargali.