Prof. Dimitri Tumanishvili
G. Chubinashili National Research Centre for
Georgian Art History and Heritage Preservation 

Basic requirement of the heritage preservation is compilation of the list of properties to be protected. In fact, without complete list of historic buildings – presently architectural monuments will be touched upon – neither our historical and art historical knowledge would be comprehensive, nor would it be possible to state definitely what legacy we have. That is why European countries had begun compilation of the monuments lists from the 19th century, the latest. Certain steps in this direction were also undertaken in our country[1] – this is evidenced by Dimitri Bakradze’s famous book “Caucasus in the Ancient Monuments of Christianity” published in 1875, where contemporary records on churches and monasteries of Georgia were gathered. In the last decades of the 19th century and early 20th century more than one Georgian and foreign archaeographer and lover of antiquities spared no efforts for the overview – “preliminary inventory” according to present phrasing – of the architectural heritage, including church-sites and fortress-sites in various regions of Georgia; just to mention some of them – Giorgi Tsereteli, countess Praskovya Uvarova, acad. Niko Marr, archimandrite (later, Catholicos, presently – canonised Saint) Ambrosi (Khelaia), Ekvtime Takaishvili and, in Soviet period – Giorgi Bochoridze.

However, from 1920s not only the political situation in the country had changed, but in the heritage protection proper – it had acquired the state importance. Certain actions were undertaken by the government of the first Georgian Democratic Republic and after 1921, thanks to the efforts of intellectuals working in People’s Commissariat of Education (Gr. Robakidze, Vuk. Beridze and others) “Monuments Protection Division”, a structural unit (however, not very effective) of the Commissariat (later – Ministry) was founded. From that time onwards, more than once lists of the significant buildings were compiled and from 1930s pasportisation (registering of the monuments) was also begun – many of us had used records by Tinatin Karumidze or Dimitri Gordeev. Identification of the monuments was quite justly considered a scholarly activity – as early as 27.II.1924, Action Plan of Art History Cabinet of Tbilisi University elaborated by Giorgi Chubinashvili foresaw “registration of monuments according to districts” and compilation of a reference book of antiquities with ID cards and full bibliography was given top priority.

Despite all these, by 1970s, it became clear that the general picture of the heritage is still far not complete. The work on monuments inventory was begun in two institutions – “Monuments Recording Division” was founded at the Institute of History of Georgian Art by the “Georgian Encyclopaedia” to provide material for the unified register of the Soviet Union and similar unit was established at Main Board for Protection of Monuments of Culture (since 1978 the Board was an independent institution). Notwithstanding considerable financing, the work took too much time and by the regaining of independence (1991) it was not yet completed. Although, over last 20 years certain scope of work was done, it is still far from finalisation. One can argue, whether it was worth to undertake these activities in parallel in two institutions, one can be amazed at some regulations of those days – e.g., although Monuments Recording Division was founded at the Institute of History of Georgian Art, research fellows of the Institute had no right to take part in the Division activities . . . However, it is quite senseless to touch upon these now and the subject of my present discussion is different; it is the issue importance of which we failed to properly recognise some 40 or 30 years ago.

As seen from the title, I will focus on the grading of the listed buildings based on their merits and values. Whatever great our love for “everything old” might be, one can never insist that everything preserved to our days is of equal artistic perfection, nor is equally significant witness of our past. In our country, similar to all others, it was necessary to single out various categories of monuments – to have clear understanding of what should to be preserved by all possible means and, on the other hand, what and to what an extent could be “sacrificed” in case no other way was found. At that time there was no sense in trying to think of categories, we were bound by common Soviet regulations, which foresaw only three categories – sites of All Union, Republican and Local significance and the main thing was to ascribe this or that building to one of those categories.

I, myself, “discovered” that these three grades are insufficient, when in 1990s, together with research fellows of the Institute of History of Georgian Art, Mrs. Liana Giorgobiani and Mr. Nik. Vacheishvili, examined records prepared by the Main Board for Protection of Monuments of Culture. It was not the case that we would have preferred some other category for this or that monument (I cannot remember to have any comments in this respect). It was quite obvious that absolutely doubtless accuracy of such an evaluation is generally unachievable. Although I believe that with adequate argumentation and proper discussion, consensus on the artistic value of artwork can be reached, still, as far as tastes are concerned, they often differ; besides, significance of the cultural properties for the public might change and good or bad might be revealed only over certain time spell – e.g., a watermill, quite ordinary, nothing outstanding in terms of technical or artistic merits might acquire importance, since only few samples of the kind are left; or another case – vividly noticeable deficiencies of the buildings constructed in 1990s made us notice solidity and professionalism of architects and builders of some samples of the “Stalinist architecture”; certainly, if in the past, we might have passed the latter by emotionless, or given them a “low grade”, now we can appreciate them better and even demand their special protection. As already said, this will always happen and that is why periodical re-inventarisation and re-evaluation of the built heritage is the general rule of heritage preservation practice. Turning back to the mentioned records examination, our attention was drawn by something else – amazing heterogeneity of the sites of “local significance” – apart from quite humble churches or towers, or dwelling houses, they comprised many featureless buildings and even those, which would rather deserve the definition of a “monument-site” than of a “monument” – e.g., several stones scattered over evened land plot. Then we thought that greater diversification would be preferable, but soon we had to face other, although similar, difficulties.

Quite naturally, in independent Georgia, apart from everything else, there was a need in our own cultural heritage legislation and table of grades; it goes without saying that old category of “All-Union significance” was acceptable no more. In late 1990s, alongside elaboration of the new law, noteworthy activities were undertaken in terms of introduction of more effective modes of recording and adaptation of the respective international experience to our specific conditions within the World Bank funded project. As far as I know, categories were not discussed specially and old Soviet triad was replaced by almost similar one – sites of local, national and, finally, international significance. The latter category was introduced further to Georgia’s joining World Heritage Convention and inscription of our several sites on the UNESCO World Heritage List; however, certain similarity with the former “All-Union” category lies in the fact that, in this case as well, granting of this category does not, ultimately depend on the Georgian side  – our most beloved and remarkable monuments of architecture cannot be ascribed to the “highest” category by our own decision, only with the UNESCO approval and on the condition of diverse, among them financial, commitments, which is not easy for the country with resources like ours and requires strictest selection of sites on our part. As you are well aware, Mtskheta churches, Kutaisi cathedral and Gelati monastery, Ushguli settlement, Tbilisi historic district and Vardzia were granted this honour, while the last two were not rejected by UNESCO, but their inscription on the World heritage List was deferred. At the same time, should not this sequence of the most outstanding sites also include, say, Alaverdi cathedral, Nekresi monastery, Samtavisi and Kumurdo churches . . . I well understand that it would be impossible to inscribe all our best on this list – none seems to have managed this. Something different concerns me: “national” significance category appears a priori non-homogeneous  – monuments of architecture, which should be grouped on two levels, are presented side by side, which definitely creates certain inconvenience – e.g., building of S. Janashia State Museum of Georgia (Georgian National Museum) and Vachnadziani Kvelatsminda church are both of “national” significance; I cannot say for the others, but for me this is not very fair. Of course, “local” significance category is also quite confusing.

Despite all these, long enough this state of things did not bother us much – in 2002-2004, when due to increasing new construction Tbilisi historic districts were under intense discussion and later, when Tbilisi Historical-Cultural Master Plan was being elaborated. The thing is that introduction of additional categories for “domestic” use, namely those of “urban” significance and “street-scape” value proved quite facilitating (“street-scape” value category is used in the materials of the Tbilisi Historical-Cultural Master Plan). Both categories were applicable to the buildings, which had no clear-cut individual features, but: in the first case – formed accents or “knots” in the urban fabric (e.g., marks the street corner, or developing along two crossing streets, “holding” it) and in the second case – contributed to the environment of homogeneous character and scale, within which listed buildings are “scattered”; the buildings proper were, certainly, to be of tolerable mastery. Such a differentiation made it possible to reveal differences of artistic merits of the buildings and identify “values to be protected” for those of lower artistic merits. There was a vague hope that these two categories would be added to the categories stipulated by the Law on Cultural Heritage. This was not done, and if I not mistaken, based on two arguments: a. such grouping does not correspond to the internationally recognised and, thus, is hardly compatible with it; b. apart from special criteria, each category should have its own protection regime, while such detailing would make it hard to differentiate respective requirements and rights.

We might have coped with the situation and tried to deal with other, no less problematic issues, if not the new draft amendment to the Law on Cultural Heritage, quite confusing, I think, which had caused much noise during the last months of 2013; proposed amendment stipulates considerable simplification of the delisting procedures for the sites of local significance (actually, active legislation identifies them as “cultural heritage sites”) in case of unspecified – and, thus, quite arbitrary – “state and strategic importance”; and what is most important, decision making on delisting is foreseen without any involvement of art historians, historians, conservationist or other experts. It should also be taken into account that, although proposed amendment is definitely linked with the desire to remove possible “obstacles”, which listed buildings are considered to be for the new construction projects in our historic cities and, firstly, Tbilisi, in case the amendment takes force, not only urban fabric will face the danger of further “cleansing”, but far larger segment of our heritage. It may, for example, sacrifice a watch tower erected by the road, on the place of which someone would wish to build, say, a gas station, or a single nave church, if it “interferes” with someone’s “business interests”. This is all the more dangerous today, since not only the properties of minimal value are listed as “mere” monuments, but also quite valuable heritage sites, for which no adequate definition was found.

In such a situation greater differentiation of categories is not only required, but is a top necessity. I think, firstly the international practice should be analysed. It seemed logical to me to start with the 21st century CoE Guides, which were also translated into Georgian and published as a recuille “Cultural Heritage” by G. Chubinashvili National Research Centre in 2008, within the framework of State Cultural Heritage Programme. 

Guidance on Inventory and Documentation of the Cultural Heritage (2001) give only general indications on the protection categories. Section “Type of designation or protection” states: “This denotes the designation or protection category. A controlled vocabulary is desirable, e.g., municipal, provincial, state, scheduled monument, world heritage site” (6.1). Here one thing is noteworthy for us – a sub-division can appear before and, so to say, “lower” the    “provincial”; I refer to the “municipal”, which denotes the properties significant for not very big settlements, which in our reality could correspond to “sub-municipal”. Introduction of such a category would be quite helpful.  

In Guidance on Heritage Assessment (2005), where nomination categories are specified separately, differentiation is a bit different. Section “Categories of Significance” indicates: “Consider here the Local, Regional, National or International significance. These may be listed as follows: internationally important; of outstanding national importance; of special national interest; of regional or local interest” (4.). As can be seen, here, the “national” significance category is divided into two, which could also be most helpful to solve our problems; besides, “regional” significance is shown as a synonym or a substitute to “local”; however, I think that these two are not actually the same and we could add them to the sequence of categories separately, one after another – “of regional significance”; “of local significance”. Likewise noteworthy is the Heritage Assessment for Montenegro (Serbia and Montenegro) document, attached to these guidelines as an example of heritage assessment. Prioritised Intervention List, apart from the “international importance” and “special national importance”, also names “universal value” as a separate category of significance. For me, the difference between the latter and the “international importance” is not quite clear, apart from the fact that the “universal value” is considered superior to the “international importance”. In terms of our present problems, last discussed CoE guidelines hardly provide substantial help. In order to fill in this gap – I repeat, to try and find solutions to our present pressing problems – quite naturally, I wished to see other relevant documentation and further to the advice of ICOMOS Georgia RCCHD project, I turned to the legislation of Great Britain, country advanced in heritage management, and publications of “English Heritage”, one of the remarkable agencies in heritage conservation. However, before turning to these materials, I would like to quote a noteworthy example of the Preliminary Technical Assessment from the abovementioned Montenegro heritage assessment document (5.3). It concerns Fortress Kosmac (1841-1850) – the site granted “international” significance category. Evaluation of its significance (7.2) is as follows: “historical – high; artistic/aesthetic – medium; technological – medium; religious/spiritual – low; symbolic/identity – high; scientific/research – medium; social/civic – low; natural – medium; economic – low; category of significance – international”. In this case, two aspects are remarkable – a. assessment is “multi-component”; b. only high historical and symbolic/identity significance was sufficient to identify this fortification building of quite a late date (19th c.) as a site of “international importance”. I think, the same approach would help us greatly in the specification of categories for our heritage. One final remark – bringing to mind our endless disputes – “substantial reconstruction perhaps to a commercial use” (hotel or hostel) is proposed as one of the optional actions to be undertaken on this half-ruined building, in order “to bring this important monument back into some sustainable and appropriate use and protect it from irreversible deterioration” (2).     

Now, let’s turn to the decisions of the British authorities and instructions of “English Heritage”. Revisions to Principles of Selection for Listing Buildings (8 March 2007) indicate that “the statutory criteria for listing are the special architectural or historic interest of a building. Many buildings are interesting architecturally or historically, but, in order to be listed, a building must have “special” interest. Buildings on the list are graded to reflect their relative architectural and historic interest” and three respective grades are identified: “Grade I – buildings of exceptional interest; Grade II* – particularly important buildings of more than special interest; Grade II – buildings of special interest, warranting every effort to preserve them” (6.5.-6.6.). 

Criteria to assess whether a building is of special interest are as follows: a. “To be of special architectural interest a building must be of importance in its architectural design, decoration or craftsmanship; special interest may also apply to nationally important examples of particular building types and techniques . . . “; b. “To be of special historic interest a building must illustrate important aspects of the nation’s social, economic, cultural, or military history and/or have close historical associations with nationally important people. There should normally be some quality of interest in the physical fabric of the building itself to justify the statutory protection afforded by listing” (6.9); c. “The extent to which the exterior contributes to the architectural or historic interest of any group of buildings of which it forms part” is also taken into account when making a listing decision. “This is generally known as group value” (6.10); d. “Desirability of preserving, on the grounds of its architectural or historic interest, any feature of the building containing a man-made object or structure fixed to the building or forming part of the land and comprised within the curtilage of the building” is also taken into consideration (6.11).

Five general principles applicable for making a listing decision are specified separately. They are as follows: A. Age and rarity – “the older a building is, and the fewer the surviving examples of its kind, the more likely it is to have special interest”. Following four chronological periods, “meant as a guide to assessment” are also specified: a. “Before 1700 – all buildings that contain a significant proportion of their original fabric are listed”; b. “From 1700 to 1840 – most buildings are listed”; c. “After 1840 – because of the greatly increased number of buildings erected and the much larger numbers that have survived, progressively greater selection is necessary”; d. “Buildings of less than 30 years old are normally listed only if they are of outstanding quality and under threat” (6.12). B. Aesthetic merits – “the appearance of a building – both its intrinsic architectural merit and any group value – is a key consideration . . . , but the special interest of a building will not always be reflected in obvious external visual quality. Buildings that are important for reasons of technological innovations, or as illustrating particular aspects of social or economic history, may have little external visual quality” (6.13). C. Selectivity – “a building may be listed primarily because it represents a particular type in order to ensure that examples of such a type are preserved. Listing in these circumstances is largely a comparative exercise and needs to be selective where a substantial number of buildings of similar type and quality survive. In such cases . . . policy is to list only the most representative or most significant examples of the type” (6.14.). D. National interest – “the emphasis in these criteria is to establish consistency of selection to ensure that not only are all buildings of strong intrinsic architectural interest included on the list, but the most significant or distinctive regional buildings that together make a major contribution to the national historic stock” (6.15). E. State of repair – this “is not a relevant consideration when deciding whether a building meets the test of special interest” (6.16).

What lessons can be learnt from the British experience? Starting from the grades – they are also three, similar to ours, but how our and their “triads” correlate? At the first glance, they are similar, but only at the first glance. The thing is that despite the indication on grading that Grade I sites are “sometimes considered internationally important”, here, as well as in the  “Principles” (6.39-40), sites of outstanding universal value inscribed on the World Heritage List form a separate group, they are not considered in the sequence of “listed” buildings. Accordingly, neither two other grades are equal to our “national” and “local” significance categories. It seems most likely that here, the possibility discernible in the “regional” and “local” coupled in the “lower” category in CoE documents is “at work”; however, in the same documents, as is known, within the ascending sequence, regional, certainly, denotes something of greater value than local. Although, in Britain, one can see no two levels of the national significance, as identified by the CoE regulations, but their criteria and principles of selection are very helpful. To say the truth, they are quite familiar to us, but, similar to the CoE “Guidance”, their systematisation is very convenient; besides, several evaluation aspects are added, which can be quite beneficial for us. Among these, I think “group value” is the most handy, which includes “urban” significance and “street-scape” value tested in our practice.  This shows that, on the one hand, this evaluation aspect is not our fancy, it is also considered noteworthy by others; on the other hand, it is clear that: it is not necessary to introduce a separate category, this aspect can be referred to as one of the conditions for listing. Most important is the indication that, in case the building is of “architectural interest”, anything else linked with it, can give grounds to listing, and provided respective examples: “finely panelled 16th c. room, a fireplace and over-mantel that has been introduced from another building, or an elaborate plaster ceiling” (6.11.).

Concerning the general principles of selection, it should be stated that they actually provide further specification of the notion “architectural interest”. First of these principles – “age and rarity” rather indicates artistic and historical dimensions and in our practice is also considered in listing and grading of the buildings; however, it would be highly desirable to avail of the similar easily legible “grid”. I think “national interest” principle is used in quite a paradoxical way – one would have expected the emphasis to be made on the common-national, while for the British the situation is different – preservation of regional-local typical features is accentuated, which is also worth notice. Maybe this could help us to save still extant samples of the vernacular architecture, which might not always meet, say, “aesthetic merits” principle (e.g., an ordinary house in Mtiuleti). “Aesthetic merits” principle is far not easy to deal with; this will be touched upon a bit later, now I would like to comment on the “selectivity” principle. I hope all will agree that it is hard – as every choice between the good and the good. And if one imagines it in action, one can be sure that: it can be used – I believe, it was used and will still be used – to demand selection of just one sample and destruction of everything else. I do not refer to any “evil” businessmen – let’s remember, how hazardous was for Paris the famous Plan Voisin drawn by outstanding Le Cobusier. It is clear that the British heritage preservationists try to give reasonably sound grounds for the selectivity – for them this is the quantity of preserved samples of various architectural types. I think, this does not, however, counterbalance the threat concealed in this principle – say, 20 equally good “Telavian” houses with their colonnades and balconies are preserved, should we surrender to someone’s decision that so many are not needed and only two would suffice? This principle seems likely to be applicable to large-scale construction activity, e.g., 19th c. “tenement houses” could be considered as such samples and definitely, 20th c. multi-apartment houses (I do not think that the most ardent worshiper of history would wish to leave more than one house from the ugly houses of Khrushchov period in Saburtalo in future); I believe it quite unfair to apply this principle to the “individualised” buildings of the non-individualistic epoch. Besides, application of this principle requires not only the knowledge of all types of buildings, but almost their state of preservation percentage, as well as detailed individual examination of the entire building stock. 

This brings us to “aesthetic merits”. As shown, apart from purely artistic, they comprise historic and technical-historic characteristics. The latter is most easily identifiable – novelty of material or technology (e.g., ferro-concrete or metal “framework”) or, on the contrary, their wide spreading in diverse chronologies or countries can easily be ascertained and measured. Historical dimension is not as “tangible” – in fact, how can the “greatness” of an event or a person be determined? E.g., what is more valuable for the country – the victory gained by St. King David IV the Builder at Didgori (presumably, known to every Georgian), or his composing “Hymns of Repentance” (which are known to few and read by even less)? Who is “greater person” – Joseph Stalin (still the most well-known of our compatriots in the world) or, say, Nikoloz Jandieri, (provincial physician, whose disinterestedness and nobleness might be remembered thanks to Otar Chiladze’s novel “Everyone That Findeth Me”)? In reality, we seem most likely to evaluate no true grandeur, but lesser or greater degree of impact of any event or person.  I think, however, efforts should not be spared to leave the memory of each generous and remarkable person in their native towns or villages.  Considerable difficulties accompany assessment of artistic merits. Apart from the danger of personal taste prejudices (as already mentioned above), objectively, buildings, which were constructed based on different artistic principles and reflecting spirit of different epochs are hardly commensurable.

It seems likely that in order to facilitate application of “selectivity” and “aesthetic merits” principles, British authorities advise respective personnel to use Listing Selection Guides elaborated by English Heritage for diverse architectural typologies. As an example, I will discuss one of them, most crucial for us – “Domestic 2: Town Houses”. As evidenced by the title, the document is focused on the urban residential houses, mainly from 17th c. onwards and including first decades of the 20th c.; major part is given to the specifically English terraced houses – rows of seemingly independent homogeneous buildings, which are actually constructed as a “unified architectural compositions of some sophistication”. Discussion of the buildings according to their chronology, gives grounds to advise the recorder what should attention be paid to (“design; decoration; planning; construction; the survival of early or unusual features”; p.10), hence, recommendations concerning grading (“High grades take account of exteriors with decorative brickwork and fine details such as door cases and interiors with an elaborate staircase, moulded panelling ornate plasterwork and chimneypieces and possibly distinctive plan forms”; p.12).

Certainly, such additional material would also be most desirable for us; at the same time: A. if one looks at the select bibliography included in the Guide, it would become quite obvious that it would be very hard for us to handle the same task. Despite a solid foundation laid by our art historians over a century, urban or rural housing architecture is not so comprehensively and in-depth studied and elaboration of a similar reference book-guide will need at least several year group research works. B. For me, personally, the Guide lacks certain precision and clarity. Maybe in England they are lucky enough to persuade each other with such implications, but our situation is doubtlessly different. Besides, I think, more detailed discussion with respective argumentation would be desirable in terms of scholarly dimension and quite necessary for convincing the wide public. Anyway, compilation of similar documentation is a future task for us – let’s hope that of not far future. 

It should also be mentioned that apart from the listed buildings, England avails of the scheduled monuments, registered parks and gardens, registered historic battlefields and protected wreck sites. I have enumerated all these to clearly show the possibilities of diverse classifications and options for discourse in this direction.

How can we, so to say, “benefit” from this documentation? I think, there is no doubt left that our grouping of monuments is in harmony with the world experience. However, the same experience vividly shows that we can diversify categories – schematic to a certain extent – which are applied in our practice. The question is – how could this be done?

Firstly, the easiest to start with is, following the British example, to consider “international significance” as an independent category, identifiable and approvable by us, and some of the sites of this grade might be additionally nominated for the inscription on the World Heritage List. This is quite an achievable task, requiring agreement of Georgian experts and state authorities, as well as slight alteration of the already extant definition of this category. The second, which will need further discussions and sharing of ideas is to divide two “lower” categories, following partly British and partly Council of Europe examples. I do not think it impossible to introduce, say, A and B subgrades in the category of “national significance” and “cultural heritage site” category. Since new subgrades are to be singled out within already approved categories, slight nuancing of the criteria might suffice and new regimes might not be necessary. Besides, thus we could avoid certain inconvenience of placing samples of distinctly different merits side by side, on the same level. Furthermore, if we replicate “group value” of the British, on the “lower” level we could easily find place for the buildings, which we had to “give up”, since “urban significance” and “street-scape” value could not be applied.

It would be highly desirable to elaborate national guidelines for assessment, or at least instructions (as a basis, textual part of the abovementioned Tbilisi Historical-Cultural Master Plan could be used, where respective categories and their criteria are indicated), to specify principles based on which we consider something to be valuable  and identify hierarchy of values. Maybe now we have no time for all these, but if we agree on the need in this activities, works are not to be put aside long; it is obvious that the words “sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof” (Mathew, 6:34) referred to the present can easily be used for the future.

References

1. W. Beridze, 50 Years of the Institute of History of Georgian Art, Tb., 1993 (in Georgian).
2. Cultural Heritage. Technical Assistance and Consulting Programme, Tb., 2008 (in Georgian).
3. Guidance on Inventory and Documentation of the Cultural Heritage, 2001, CoE.
4. Guidance on Heritage Assessment, 2005, CoE.
5. Revisions to Principles of Selection for Listing Buildings, 2007, English Heritage.
6. Listing Selection Guide. Domestic 2: Town Houses, 2011, English Heritage.