Chkondideli Ioane

Ioane Chkondideli, Archbishop of Chkondidi from about 1060 to 1110. He is remembered by the title of Synkellos.

In the 1050s, while still a layman, he accompanied Bagrat IV and Queen Mariam to Constantinople at the court of the Byzantine emperor Constantine IX Monomachos (1042–1054). Here they met George the Hagiorite, who had come from Mount Athos, and sent a large offering to Athos with him, wake was held for both Ioane and his brother in Athos.

In 1059, at the behest of Bagrat IV, he brought George the Hagiorite from Antioch to Georgia, on whose initiative Ioane was consecrated as Chkondideli. Ioane Chkondideli assisted George the Hagiorite  in settling church affairs in Georgia; in 1065 and 1066–1067 Ioane Chkondideli was Bagrat IV's ambassador to the court of the Byzantine emperor. During this embassy, ​​he asked the monk Giorgi Khutsesmonazoni to write a biography of George the Hagiorite. The Georgian Church has established January 3(16) as the day of Ioane Chkondideli's commemoration.

 

Source: გიორგი მცირე, ცხორებაჲ გიორგი მთაწმიდელისაჲ, წგ.: ძველი ქართული აგიოგრაფიული ლიტერატურის ძეგლები, წგ. 2, ილ. აბულაძის რედ., თბ., 1967.

Literature: ბერძენიშვილი ნ., სავაზირო ფეოდალურ საქართველოში, წგ.: საქართველოს ისტორიის საკითხები, წგ. 3, თბ., 1966.

 

B. Lominadze